Ce chapitre est intéressant parce qu’il est indéniable que nous vivons dans un monde où fiction et réalité se mélangent. Diana parle des Docudramas, ces faux-documentaires qui mélangent réalité et fiction. Certains sont de vraies œuvres de création, comme 

, mais ils ne sont pas sans poser problème. Le Jedi-ism est une religion inspirée de Star Wars et il y a un documentaire « If Star Wars Was Real » qui a entraîné une sorte de culte. Diana souligne que « vouloir croire » est une sorte de tendance lourde de notre époque (je pense qu’elle explique que cette expression remonte aux X-Files). Whitley Strieber, qui assume de pied ferme la réalité de son abduction, avoue néanmoins qu’il a été influencé par les films de science-fiction de catégorie B qu’il a visionnés pendant son enfance (voir 

Disons-le d’emblée, ce livre n’apporte rien de véritablement nouveau sur le plan concret. Tout au plus une bonne synthèse du tissu mythologique dont la trame est lancée depuis 80 ans ou plus. Un arc narratif qui tient assez bien la route: un récit qui commence dans le désert où Diana est initiée sur un lieu sacré de la quête mythique de la vérité sur les ovnis et qui finit au Vatican, qui est en quelque sorte sa terre d'adoption puisque Diana est spécialiste en étude des religions ET catholique, où son initiateur est à son tour initié puisqu’il décide, contre toute attente, de se convertir – sa première communion sera sacrée par le pape lui-même! 

Le substrat factuel est donc extrêmement mince: il est essentiellement question de deux personnages qui parlent sous pseudonyme: James et Tyler D. Évidemment, la blogosphère s’est immédiatement liguée pour comprendre qui ils étaient. James a admis depuis sa réelle identité: il s’agit de 

, professeur à Stanford, détenteur de nombreux brevets dans le domaine des biotechs, et entrepreneur à succès. Selon toute vraisemblance, Tyler D. serait 

, lui aussi entrepreneur dans les biotechs et ingénieur ayant travaillé pour la NASA qui a aussi offert ses services à SpaceX. En plus de ces deux personnages centraux, on découvre aussi quelques autres individus plus ou moins publics, qui ont fait profession de foi sur leur détermination à comprendre le Phénomène. Citons Edgar Mitchell, ancien astronaute sur la mission Apollo 14 et fondateur de l’Institut des Sciences Noétiques.

Ce qui rend ce livre intéressant, c’est qu’il fait honneur à ce qu’on pourrait décrire comme le Grand Mystère qui entoure le phénomène. Il y a les nombreux parallèles, établis de longue date par Jacques Vallée, entre divers types d’apparitions qui ont été amalgamées avec différentes traditions religieuses et un certain nombre de traits distinctifs liés aux ovnis. Mais il y a aussi, et surtout, la dimension subjective telle que décrite par les individus qui les ont perçues, où la stupéfaction et parfois la terreur, laissent place le plus souvent à une forme de fascination mystique. Ce qui est frappant, et que Diana met bien en lumière, c’est la tranformation personnelle qui s’ensuit et qui n’est pas sans rapport avec les illuminations spirituelles, relativement fréquentes et en tout cas bien connues, que l’on associe souvent à une forme ou l’autre de religiosité. La conversion de Tyler, donnée en point d’orgue du livre, en est évidemment la parfaite illustration.

Là où ce livre fascine et innove, à mon avis, c’est en suggérant non seulement la possibilité d’une évolution spirituelle médiée par une forme de Contact, mais en indiquant un chemin possible vers cette évolution; un chemin qui fait la part belle tant à la science et à la technologie qu’à la découverte de notre capacité à nous ouvrir à une forme de Grâce nous permettant d’accéder à des pouvoirs de type psychique. Un cercle virtueux se met alors en place, où nos intuitions inspirées se transforment en technologies qui, à leur tour nous permettent d’amplifier ces intuitions pour les rendre de plus en plus claires, de plus en plus opérantes. C’est là que les personnages de James et de Tyler fascinent, car tous deux donnent des indices très concrets de la façon dont, selon leurs dires, ils seraient touchés par cette Grâce et comment nous pourrions peut-être, nous aussi, nous en approcher.

J’ai commencé par lire le deuxième livre de Diana Pasulka sur ce sujet, « 

 », qui est la suite de celui-ci et je n’y avait trouvé que peu d’intérêt. « American Cosmic » est un livre beaucoup plus important à mon avis et je comprends que Diana en ait tiré une belle notoriété. Peut-être devrais-je maintenant relire  « Encounters »,…

Le premier livre de Diana Pasulka, qui l'a propulsée parmi le panthéon des exégètes du Phénomène.

American Cosmic

L’influence des médias sur notre perception du Phénomène

in December 2017, the *New York Times* published an article featuring the testimony of Luis Elizondo, the former director of the Pentagon’s Aerospace Advanced Threat Identification Program, who alleged that the United States ran a secret program to study UFOs.[1](private://read/01hwxgbc4b8xxgj0tj4vqm6bv4/#actrade-9780190692889-miscMatter-10-note-140) This article set off a firestorm of “disclosure” or “unofficial disclosure,” which prompted public demands under the Freedom of Information Act that the US government provide any debris or “alloys” they might be keeping.

I know the North Carolina state director of MUFON and several field investigators. My associations with them have been friendly and professional. Their research methods, on my observation, are completely rational and objective, and err on the side of skepticism. However, individuals associated with MUFON are not necessarily representative. Experiencers I’ve interviewed say their experiences with the larger organization have not gone well. Several have reported that their experiences have been made public in a completely altered form. When a person reports an experience to MUFON, it goes into a national database of reports, and these reports become the property of MUFON. They can do what they want with them—like sell them to television production companies.

Because of his connections, Edgar said, he was privileged to know that extraterrestrials had dismantled several weapons that the United States had launched into space. He said that they did this because our weapons, particularly nuclear weapons, not only damaged humans and our environment but also somehow damaged their environment. He said that there were different species of aliens, and that there were good ones and bad ones. The ones who intervened in our space explorations were good ones.

He was also a practitioner of remote viewing. What was more surprising to me was that he had conducted remote viewing experiments in space during the Apollo lunar mission. These experiments were not sanctioned by NASA, and Edgar said that they were “secret.” Edgar Mitchell, like Tyler D., was part of the hidden and unofficial history of the American space program that I had been discovering—the cosmonauts and rocket scientists, like Jack Parsons, who believed in extraterrestrial or nonhuman beings that interacted with humans with the goal of helping them achieve space travel and, in Edgar’s case, peace on Earth.

I was mostly a bystander in the discussions of quantum theory and mechanics, but I was intrigued that so many of the scientist-believers used this relatively new branch of physics to explain the phenomenon. This included Edgar, one of six humans to have walked on the moon on the Apollo 14 lunar landing mission. Edgar earned a PhD in aeronautics and astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He was also the founder of the Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS), which is dedicated to the study of consciousness, and Quantrek, an institute populated by physicists and scientists who study energy and consciousness. He founded these institutions after a remarkable, transcendent experience he had while on his way home from the moon, floating in space, and looking at Earth.

Quantum Frontiers: A Blog by the Institute for Quantum Information and Matter

Tyler’s understanding of the body/phenomenon interface as an information translational process is grounded in materiality. The body and materiality are indispensable conditions for this process, he believes. He also refers to the idea that the human brain is not the center for thinking or even for the most important types of thoughts—the kind that lead to innovative and truly creative thinking.

I find that this memory/contact with an intelligent source (God) is much smarter than me, is more creative, and carries more energy and insight than I ever could using my own RAM and hard drive in my simple mind. I need to have access to the depth and wisdom of this God-like internet to reach the fullest potential in my life, it seems.

Better Horrors: From Terror to Communion in Whitley Strieber’s *Communion* (1987),” *Social Research: An International Quarterly* 84 (2014): 897–920.

Reflecting on a talk by “alien abductee” Whitley Strieber about the experiences that informed his best-selling novel, *Communion*, Jeffrey Kripal notes the role played by popular culture: “One evening he [Whitley] explained to us that he was perfectly aware that his visionary experience of the visitors was deeply informed by the bad sci-fi B movies that he had seen in such numbers as a kid in the cold war 1950s in southern Texas.”[28](private://read/01hwxgbc4b8xxgj0tj4vqm6bv4/#actrade-9780190692889-miscMatter-10-note-71)

After Ager cracked the code of the monolith and posted his analysis on YouTube in 2007, he received hundreds of thousands of positive responses. Apparently, the time had at last come to understand the movie—and the monolith

Jacques has achieved his status precisely because he has never concluded the phenomenon is anything specific. In fact, Jacques has infuriated most ufologists because he won’t fall in line. All Jacques has ever claimed is that the phenomenon seems infinitely variable. Every time you claim it is one thing, he shows you twenty counter-examples. But, per Jacques, the overarching message the phenomenon appears to send is ‘you are not alone’—styled to the level of your cultural understanding and abilities.”

Jacques, one of the first truly innovative thinkers on the subject, suggests that the UFO might not be an object, but some kind of “window” into another dimension. The window metaphor is quite interesting, as a window *is* a physical object but one through which we see into another place. Could the *hardware* of James’s subjects be like this, physical yet somehow like a conduit, or windowlike?[5](private://read/01hwxgbc4b8xxgj0tj4vqm6bv4/#actrade-9780190692889-miscMatter-10-note-29)

To scientifically capture all these experiences or events, argued James, the people predisposed to having them—that is, to being contacted by nonhuman intelligence—must be studied. The literature shows that contact manifests as anomalous experiences, as telepathic communication with aerial objects and beings, or as anomalous cognition (knowledge of future events or other knowledge for which there is no conventional explanation). It also manifests as random sightings of aerial phenomena that sometimes interact with witnesses through such things as “beams of light.” The Bible and records from Catholic history and other religious histories are replete with accounts of such events. James’s own experiences and those he had recently learned about from his relatives informed his theory, but he had also studied others who reported them. As a scientist, he was aware of two things, one explainable, the other not. His research found that some people exhibited knowledge of events for which they should not, according to what we know about normal processes of acquiring information. He could not explain this, but he relied on quantum theory to suggest that particles distant from each other seem to have knowledge of each other and even affect each other (“spooky action at a distance”). And scientists don’t know why this is so. He suggested that perhaps there is a quantum field of information and somehow his subjects tap into it. He theorized that the ability to contact or be contacted is likely to be genetically determined. Since genes define structures and architectures of the tissues of the body, genes would underlie the components of a brain receiver for such information. He said, “Once the phenomenon contacts humans, from wherever it originates, it leaves a signature. That signature is traceable. It is physical, physiological; it is processed then in a world that tools of science can study. We can identify it.”

This education could be accomplished by mass media such as television, motion pictures, and popular articles. Basis of such education would be actual case histories which had been puzzling at first but later explained. The Jam Handy Co. which made World War II training films (motion picture and slide strips) was also suggested, as well as Walt Disney, Inc. animated cartoons. It was believed that business clubs, high schools, colleges, and television stations would all be pleased to cooperate in the showing of documentary type motion pictures if prepared in an interesting manner.[3](private://read/01hwxgbc4b8xxgj0tj4vqm6bv4/#actrade-9780190692889-miscMatter-10-note-27)

James picked up a book by Harvard researcher John Mack, *Abduction: Human Encounters with Aliens*. James at first thought the book was fiction. He was shocked by what he read. The experiences of Mack’s subjects were exactly like his own. They described night visitors who paralyzed them and seemed to watch them in their sleep. The beings also spoke to the subjects telepathically. Mack had gained notoriety for his claim that the experiencers were psychologically healthy and that the experiences they described were common. He saw this as a significant cultural development that demanded serious scholarly attention.

By the end of the book, James realized he was reading what amounted to the story of his life.

“I basically believe, and there is evidence for this, that our DNA is a receptor and transmitter. It works at a certain frequency—the same frequency, in fact, that we use to communicate with our satellites in deep space. Humans are a type of satellite, in fact. So, in order to receive the signals and to transmit the signals, we have to tune our physical bodies and DNA. Because of this, I make sure I sleep really well. I use the eight plus one rule. That is, I sleep for eight hours, wake up, and then make myself go back to bed for an hour. That one hour, the top-off, really makes or breaks my day. I barely drink alcohol, as it interferes with sleep, and I never drink coffee. Coffee really messes up the signal.”

The hope was that private industry would reverse-engineer the technology and provide Americans with an edge in the global marketplace. His book, *The Day After Roswell* (1997), appeared on the *New York Times* bestseller list.

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, regarded as the founding father of rocketry and aeronautics, believed that ethereal beings, or nonhuman intelligences, were trying to communicate with humans through symbols. He wrote:

We are made as the “ethereal beings,” existing beyond our dimensions of recognized reality. These higher beings are in communication with us, reading our thoughts and sending us messages through celestial symbols which most of us do not even perceive, much less understand. A genius is one who comprehends and channels these messages from higher beings into technologies, products, and even art.[3](private://read/01hwxgbc4b8xxgj0tj4vqm6bv4/#actrade-9780190692889-miscMatter-10-note-17)

What he learned there wasn’t typical information. He wasn’t shown anything and didn’t read about anything, but he believes he was in the proximity of something that emitted energy and frequencies that changed the way he thought. His desk was next to a square room that was covered in concrete and metal.

“There was something in there that either emitted frequencies or signals and they didn’t want those to escape or they didn’t want signals to get in. I never knew which. It was a mysterious place, and we weren’t allowed to talk about it.”

That room, Tyler felt, zapped him with energy that changed the “frequencies” of his body and his thoughts. It was after this experience that he began to have more “memories” of biomedical technologies.

I asked him why he was interested in carrying on a correspondence with me, a scholar of religion. He said, “I have mentors in the space program. One of them, who is now retired, explained that the next discovery in my field is going to come from your field. I am at the limit of understanding what I can from a materialist perspective. My mentor explained that mysticism, religion, and consciousness is where I need to go to learn what’s next. That the mind–machine interface is the next frontier.”

Do you recognize that area?”

“What?” I wasn’t sure where he was going with the question. He knew I’d never been there.

“This scene was probably recreated in the first episode of the last season of *The X-Files*,” he said.

James and I stood there looking at him, incredulous.

“Yes,” he continued. “Someone from their production team had either been here or knew someone who had. It makes me wonder if they had an insider on their team.”

Each of the scientists with whom I engaged was passionately obsessed with his research, but none of them would ever offer conclusions as to what the phenomenon was or where it came from. The suggestion that the phenomenon is the basis for a new form of religion elicited sneers and disgust. To them, the phenomenon was too sacred to become religious dogma.

Swedenborg claimed that, with the assistance of an angel, he had visited Mercury, Mars, Venus, and the moon. He claimed to have spoken to beings on those planets and he published his experiences in a book, *Life on Other Planets* (1758)

When Star Wars Became Real

L’influence des médias sur notre perception du Phénomène