It came as no surprise to me that ABC had the nerve to present a ridiculous waste of time in place of any serious inquiry into the UFO phenomenon when ‘The UFO Phenomenon -- Seeing Is Believing’ aired on their broadcast television network. The only thing they got right was the title. It suggests that no matter how strong the scientific evidence may be against an extra-terrestrial explanation for any UFO encounter, people will not accept it and believe what they saw instead. However, let’s take a moment to examine the science that has provided some of those often repeated explanations for what people are seeing.

Project Bluebook was the official U.S. Government inquiry into the UFO Phenomenon and the Air Force was responsible for it. In fact, they created the term U.F.O. (Unidentified Flying Object). While they may have done so to appear neutral, they also did it to save Air Force personnel the embarrassment of asking people about seeing Flying Saucers.

To say that Bluebook was a halfhearted effort is an understatement. After assembling a small group of people to investigate incidents and prepare reports, they turned the information over to scientists who examined it. One of those scientists was Dr. J. Allen Hynek. Like most of his fellow scholars, Hynek was a bit of a skeptic. He agreed that ninety-five percent of the UFO reports shown to him by the Air Force could be explained, but became concerned about the other five percent.

As an organized person, Hynek didn’t like the way files were handled. He later indicated that some files may have been kept back from scientific review, while others were lost or misplaced by the Air Force. Hynek was also concerned about how the Military misused some of the scientific explanations offered to them. Despite sightings and information provided to Bluebook by trained observers like Police Officers and Pilots, the Air Force often belittled their reports and even purposely botched some investigations. Here is a Case in point from the daze of Bluebook:

After several New Jersey State Police Officers witnessed the landing of an unknown object, they found that the grass and soil had been oddly affected. Convinced this was worthy of reporting to Bluebook, they notified the Air Force. While the Police Officers waited days for Bluebook Investigators to arrive, they carefully preserved the area as if it were a crime scene. When Air Force investigators finally showed up, the Police Officers were horrified by their apathy. After ignoring and even breaking down carefully placed cords and barricades designed to highlight and protect the affected area from public contamination, the military investigators started smoking and throwing their butts into the circular pattern.

The Air Force departed that site in haste. They spent a few minutes talking to the Police Officers, then told them that the explanation was probably Swamp Gas. Dr. Hynek later commented that the environmental factors needed for Swamp Gas were absent from that site and many others where the exact same explanation was offered in place of any real attempt to discover what actually happened. In the end, those well-meaning Police Officers were embarrassed and humiliated. Their efforts to preserve evidence was squandered and no real investigation of any kind was properly conducted by the Bluebook Investigators.

Dr. Hynek probably subscribed to the same scientific mumbo jumbo that his fellow Bluebook scholars had spent their lives selling to the public. However, he was intelligent enough to move past the world of hypothetic situations and applied scientific guesswork based on unproven suppositions. When scientific theories simply didn’t offer credible answers to unexpected questions, Hynek was willing to consider something else.

Like most Scientists and scholars who dare to buck the system, the late Dr. Hynek was forced to endure the constant charge that he had simply lost his objectivity and become fascinated with non-existent Aliens and their flying machines. The same fate befell the late Dr John Mack, a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Like many in the medical profession, Mack discovered that some people who were making claims of being abducted by Aliens may have had some level of proof to back those claims up. At the least, Mack was willing to consider the possibility that not all of these people were imagining the abductions. Once he took that stand, the electronic press forgot all about his Harvard credentials. They couldn’t wait to do slam segments on him and did so with vigor.

The American News Media have become willing slaves to Junk Science. Scientists tell us that life is out there, but it simply makes no sense to believe it would come here. They use charts, light year figures and dimensional statistics to prove their points. The media believes the Scientists and we believe the media. The problem is that both the media and science have been wrong about things before. Each time we send an advanced probe to one of our neighboring planets or discover evidence about them here on earth, we find that many of the things that we believe about those worlds is incorrect.

The decade of the 1990’s was not kind to the world of Science when it came to their statements about the planet Mars. A fossil believed to indicate that primitive life once existed on Mars was discovered in a meteorite found in Antarctica in 1984. Once the Martian origin of the meteorite was established in 1993, new high resolution scanning technology was used to examine the rock with an electron microscope. It was then that the images of fossilized primitive cellular life were seen and photographed.

When the meteorite information was offered to the public, the press conference became kind of a polite scientific free for all. It was very obvious that, despite the evidence, there were those who were simply unwilling or unable to believe it. Even some of the cable networks who devote much of their programming to science went out of their way to try and debunk the meteorite evidence. Despite their best efforts, those programs could not disprove what had been proposed about life on Mars based on this little rock found on Earth.

Scientists have often been wrong about what goes on in their own back yard here on Earth. When NASA was given the go ahead to put people on the Moon, they faced some very unpleasant facts. These facts were delivered to their clipboards by Science. The Van Allen Radiation Belt was one of the first concerns facing our lunar space program. Predicted and later confirmed by Astrophysicist James A. Van Allen, these two belts often thought of as one seemed to present a serious threat to the life of any Astronaut leaving the Earth’s orbit. Considering the proposed size and payload of the first moon rocket, it was just not going to be feasible to provide the kind of lead shielding needed to protect humans against that radiation danger.

As engineers took on this challenge, they noticed something odd. Scientists couldn’t seem to agree on the intensity of the belt, the type of radiation in it or the actual danger it presented. Instead of waiting for a bunch of stuffed shirts to hash it all out, they went against convention scientific wisdom and won the day. The Astronauts went to the Moon and returned (several times) without any noticeable short or long term radiation effects.

Scientists and Astronomers are very skeptical about forms of intelligent life other then humans existing in the Universe. Why? Because they still cannot even define what life or intelligent life really is here on Earth? If you ask ten scientists for their definition of life, each will give an answer based on their own theories and politics. It’s like the old Science Class joke about the anti-gravity pen.

When discussing gravity, the teacher asks, “What happens when you pick up a pen and let it go on Earth?” The answer is obvious: It drops to the ground because of gravity. Then the teacher asks, “What would happen if you did the same thing on the Moon?” Before anyone can answer, the teacher says, “It would float away.” One of the students not asleep in that class then asks, “If that’s true, why didn’t the Astronauts who walked on the Moon just float away?” The teacher answers, “Because they had heavy boots.”

That little object lesson speaks volumes about what is wrong with Science. Not only are many so called Scientists unfamiliar with their own accepted theories and beliefs, but they tend to adjust their tenets to fit most any situation. They like to apply Earth Psychics and Science to everything else in the Universe. Anything on earth or beyond that doesn’t seem to fit in to the accepted Scientific Theorems is not real or worthy of their study. Intelligent life may exist out there, but it cannot travel to Earth because they say so!

Another factor that contributed to the dribble that ABC dished out to the public in their UFO Special was good old journalistic bigotry. Just like the scientists who refuse to give up an outdated hypothesis in favor of a proven fact, the mainstream journalists simply cannot admit that they may have been wrong. For years, all the major broadcast networks were more then happy to agree with anything the government had to say about UFOs. They read press releases like real news and filmed pseudo-experts who debunked any and every UFO sighting, regardless of the evidence.

ABC News showed their true colors when they joined the ranks of other broadcast news organizations that aired a press conference about the Roswell UFO Crash held at the Pentagon in the 1990’s. The U.S. Military wanted to convince the media that material found at the Roswell UFO Crash site was actually pieces of a Mogul Balloon. Their presentation also indicated that the bodies described as those of Aliens were really deformed dummies dropped from high altitude experiments. Finally, they paraded an official before the media who they said was ‘in charge of the Pentagon’ and could vouch for the fact that no extra-terrestrial materials from crashed UFOs were currently being stored there. So what’s wrong with all that?

First, given the amount of material described by Major Marcel in the debris field at Roswell in 1947, there would have had to have been many Mogul balloons all crashing at the same time and in the same place to account for so much material. Second, considering the fact that people were used to finding pieces of those balloons all over the place, how would they all mistake this particular debris field for something completely different? Third, the dummies weren’t even used in the area until as early as 1954. Fourth, the Official who claimed no extra-terrestrial materials were being held by the U.S. Military was actually the General Services Administration Bureaucrat in charge of supplying the Pentagon with all the physical items needed for everyday operation. If you ran out of toilet paper, this was the guy who made sure more was available.

It didn’t really matter to the major news organizations whether or not the government had a good explanation for Roswell. As long as a few officers showed up, had some charts, made a few jokes and put on a good show, the deal was sealed. Neither the news organizations or the government ever had any intention of treating any inquiry into Roswell as serious. Proof of this was the Sci-Fi Channel’s embarrassing treatment of the Roswell and Kecksburg UFO crashes. While claiming that they were making an effect to uncover the truth, Sci-Fi used Bryant Gumbel to sell the public a bill of goods. As with all the other inquiries, the best witnesses, stories and evidence was ignored.

Where did ABC get all that material for their UFO Special? Enter the wide eyed UFO enthusiasts. As someone who has had a vast amount of experience being covered by the press, I know better then to spend my grocery money making copies of all my good stuff to give to media types. Sadly, the people who foolishly decided to work with ABC News didn’t. Once the network news folks had a nice selection of visuals and a list of people to selectively interview, it was just a matter of filming and editing. As if it was any surprise, the people who gave their time, money and effort to help a multi-billion dollar company sell air time during what was sure to be a ratings draw were less then happy. Despite talk of lawsuits and broken promises. The damage has already been done.

Doesn’t anyone watch those TV Judge Shows? They always yell at people who don’t ‘GET IT IN WRITING!’ It boggles my mind that intelligent people can allow themselves to be taken in by the kind of people who run the mainstream news media. For them it’s not about the facts, it’s about politics, ratings and revenue. Despite being philosophically and intellectually out of touch with most of their Viewers, these News Organizations pander to an audience that no longer exists. They feel it’s their duty to play the skeptics and debunk anything that science decides isn’t worth their time.

There are plenty of people in the UFO and paranormal research field who are self-important buffoons that feel we should all hang on every word they say and believe every theory they put forth. These kinds of folks are tailor made for events like the ABC News UFO Special. I can recall back in the late 1980s when a syndicated program entitled ‘UFO COVER-UP LIVE’ appeared on national and international television. It was hosted by a very embarrassed Mike Farrell (yes, that guy from the M.A.S.H.) who could barely keep from laughing. Given the guest list of so-called experts, that didn’t surprise me. In the end, all the public got from that show was that the U.S. Government was keeping live Space Aliens as prisoners somewhere in Virginia and that they loved Baskin-Robbins strawberry ice cream.

It’s worth noting that as many sincere people get involved and taken in by these projects as insincere. However, when the good people get hurt, we all do. As a Paranormal Researcher, I have always been aware that everything I say or do with the media reflects on my peers and those I have worked with as witnesses or whistleblowers. I have turned down far more media opportunities then I have accepted. When I do face the media, it’s about the information and not about me. That instantly became one of the problems with the ABC News treatment of UFOs.

Most people have no idea how the news media decides to approach a topic. They just assume that there is a sincere search for the truth and willingness to listen to those who may have it. In reality, the news is always sifted through skeptical, philosophical, scientific and political filters. The story is what they say it is and nothing more or less. I have no doubt that ABC promised the sun, moon and stars to some of the good people who worked with them on the UFO Special. However, they should have read between the lines. Beyond the built in filters, whenever any major news organization tackles a subject, it’s always about the people involved and never about the subject itself.

If I agreed to give an exclusive interview to ABC News and found a way to bring a living Extra-Terrestrial before their cameras, I had better be sure that my fly was zipped. Why? Because despite the fact that a living, breathing Alien was standing in their presence, the report would end up being about my open zipper. That is we will never see any major news organization break the story that UFOs exist and may be piloted by Aliens.

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Author: Bill Knell

Author\'s Email: billknell@cox.net

Author\'s Website: http://www.ufoguy.com

A native New Yorker now living in Arizona, Bill Knell is a forty-something guy with a wealth of knowledge and experience. He\'s written hundreds of articles offer advice on a wide variety of subjects. A popular Speaker, Bill Knell presents seminars on a number of topics that entertain, train and teach. A popular radio and television show Guest, you\'ve heard Bill on thousands of top-rated shows in all formats and seen him on local, national and international television programs.