UFO. Three little letters but one big mystery. Something as simple as Unidentified Flying Objects ought not be so hard to decipher. Yet the solution to the "UFO problem" has eluded most people for nearly fifty years. This assertion doesn't take into consideration the apparent fact that the phenomena has escaped our conceptual grasp for humanity's entire history. Not all strands of the present day UFO dialogue accepts the above as facts. Rather, they prefer to accept only hard evidence of modern accounts of interactions with superior technologies instead of ancient and modern subjective/anecdotal narrative accounts of interactions with the unknown.

Far from having a "solution" we are graced with an increasing number of valuable perspectives, each engendering a probability or some level of truth. The nuts and bolts approach to UFO sighting/encounter reports may give us valuable insight into the mechanisms, factors, and variables that allow for the reality of UFO phenomena. Our current understanding of reality is a valid model for certain levels of phenomena. UFOs, as "objects" that seemingly defy fundamental laws of physics, appear to threaten the very foundations of scientific assumption.

Thankfully, a host of soft-science perspectives are beginning to balance the scales of the UFO "debate." Folklorists, transpersonal psychologists, anthropologists, quantum physicists, sociologists, etc. are allowing us to look at the broader (and deeper) human significance of these phenomena. Through these fields we have seen the rise of feminist, post modern, deconstructive perspectives which have begun to "level the playing field." Just in time, it would seem, for the creation of a new collective, inclusive dialogue that could synthesize the myriad possible perspectives into a diverse yet interwoven tapestry of knowing.

The models of global UFO phenomena I lend most credence to have been described variously as the Gaia UFO Hypothesis, the Cultural Thermostat or Cultural Deconstruction Hypotheses, Jungian Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious, Tectonic Strain Theory, Earth Lights Hypothesis, the Pyschotronic Conspiracy and more. While all of these share certain base attributes many of them have been perceived as mutually exclusive. Most are reductionistic and mechanistic and do not allow for the possibilities of non-human intelligences or consciousness playing a part in the hypothesis. Very few have seen the broader perspective that encompasses the possibility of the UFO as a "vehicle" for communication. It is this possibility that I wish to explore.

Quantum physics, the hypothesis of formative causation, and morphic resonance theory are some of the modern models for the mechanisms of mind and matter interactions. The paradoxes predicted by quantum physics are explainable within certain holographic cosmologies.

The general ideas of quantum physics have begun to filter down towards a general understanding by the populace. Yet the media and mainstream culture don't always reflect this new awareness. Science fiction has been exploring these realms for some time now and has played a large role in the dissemination of these concepts. But the hypotheses of Formative Causation and Morphic Resonance remain obscure to most. Yet these ideas have striking correlations to aspects of quantum mechanics and experiments which support "action at a distance" phenomena. Simply stated, formative causation supposes that there are hierarchical fields organized at all levels of complexity which govern everything from physical "laws," and biology, to weather and social behavior. These "fields" are maintained through morphic resonance with past fields. Thus the physical laws of the universe are less laws and more accurately identified as the habits of nature. The reason they are so powerful is because they have been in self resonance for so long, billions of years in some cases.

These ideas were met with much ballyhoo and criticism when first put forth. Biologist Rupert Sheldrake's book detailing the hypothesis (A New Science of Life) was declared the book most suitable for burning by a major academic science magazine. Yet his theories are as testable as any other and have been tested with results consistently supporting the theory.

In the years since Sheldrake proposed this theory he and other have expounded on it and applied it to the realm of the human mind by comparing the hierarchy of morphic fields to Jung's collective unconscious as well as physicist David Bohm's implicate order. The implications of such speculations have not eluded parapsychologists or ufologists in the European community. Jenny Randles, Lyall Watson, Paul Devereux, and probably more, have applied these concepts to the range of strange phenomena called variously fortean, UFOs, paranormal and the psychic. Since the early nineteen-eighties they have explored the possibility that David Bohm's implicate order could be the "underlying ether" through which Mind-At-Large operates via morphic field resonance.

In terms of Jung's collective unconscious the Archetypes can be seen as the dominat morphic fields operating through morphic resonance. If the human brain is a tuner for "frequencies" within this SuperSpectrum of mind then extraordinary phenomena like telepathy and death visions become easily explained.

A couple of years ago when, for a time, I felt truly on my personal UFO Tao (path of ufo inquiry) I chanced to encounter Robert Anton Wilson's fun and fascinating book The New Inquisition . Within its pages I was educated in the ways of Po logic; a way of thinking "invented" by psychologist Edward de Bono which allows for perceiving beyond the old Aristotelian either/or, true/false paradigm.

"...where linear Aristotelian logic works with familiar associations or generalizations (called "Laws of Thought," of course, by those who have made Aristotle their Idol), Po thinking moves laterally with unfamiliar associations. Dr. de Bono claims that Po thinking unleashes creativity and measurably improves students' ability to solve unfamiliar problems."

Here we see the roots of psychic association, meaning, and synchronicity, as well as schizophrenia, paranoia, and conspiracy theory. Wilson coined the term SynchroNet to describe the web of interconnections glimpsed by the mystic and ourselves when we experience oneness and/or synchronicity. For a brief moment we are reconnected to the OverMind, the implicate order, the holographic cosmic organism, the noosphere, totality reality. But only for an instant. Those who dwell there, whether by choice or not, are described as shaman or schizophrenic, depending upon which society they live within.

"Of course, some Po thinking may lead to poetry or great surrealist paintings, instead of science. There is no guarantee as to where Po will land you, which is part of the justification for thinking it relates to that mystery we call 'creativity.' "

UFOs Po Rabbits? That's outrageous! But in accordance with the all-is-one paradigm of holographic non-locality we must relent that "you can insert a Po between any two allegedly separate things or areas of knowledge and there will be a valid perspective gained." Even with UFOs Po Rabbits?

"In an early novel, Illuminatus-written in collaboration with Robert J. Shea-I created a character, Joe Malik, who is abducted by the crew of a UFO and later initiated into an odd religious sect, Discordianism, which gives him the holy name, U. Wascal Wabbit, taken from the Bugs Bunny cartoons (in which Elmer Fudd is forever calling Bugs 'You wascal wabbit!')

"Harmless comedy, of a surrealist flavor.

"15 October 1975 Chicago Tribune: a mysterious cattle mutilation 50 miles northwest of Chicago. In addition to the slaughtered cattle, there was also a beheaded rabbit . Police are said to be "investigatng" reports that a UFO was involved.

"A UFO and a sinister rabbit story-as if my book were coming alive-

"London Fortean Times No. 28 (1977)-article by Nigel Watson, "Strange Encounters in Yorkshire," deals with a family that has repeatedly seen UFOs while rabbit-hunting.

"Martin S. Kottmeyer, the founder of MEBON [Mutual Easter Bunny Observation Network, ed.], explained in a letter to me that the idea behind this remarkable organization came from the writers who have suggested that human expectations create UFO sightings. Now, there are two schools of thought who both share that opinion, but who otherwise contradict each other totally. For convenience, these may be very loosely called the Reductionists and the Surrealists. The Reductionists say that human expectations create UFOs by making people hallucinate, and that's all. The Surrealists say that human expectations really create UFOs, so to speak; phrases that the former group despises-you know, phrases like 'psycho-kinesis' and 'synchronicity' and 'mind-matter interaction'-get tossed around happily by the more exuberant theorists of the group I call Surrealists.

"Mr. Kottmeyer and his friends in MEBON decided to check the hypothesis that human expectations might create Easter Bunny sightings. When they started searching the literature and sending out inquiries, they did not find any unambiguous E. B. sightings, but they did find something a bit fey.

"They found, in fact, conjunctions of rabbits with UFOs."

Robert Anton Wilson - UFOs Po Rabbits - from The New Inquisition.

Within weeks of reading these words the associative synchronicity beast had drawn me into its clutches. I discovered that a co-worker (pseudonym Nancy) had seen a white, egg-shaped UFO while tending to her rabbits back in the mid-eighties! This intelligent young lady was 16 years old at the time of her sighting. She was training to become a research librarian when we met during our mutual employment at the city of Austin's public library.

She was living with her parents and kid sister in their Chelmsford, Middlesex Massachusets home. It was around dusk on that late summer day when she was putting her rabbits in their pen for the night that she turned to go back to the house and was startled by her younger sister who had jumped from behind an object in order to frighten Nancy. Apparently all fear from this surprise was immediately transfixed upon the object which now held her complete attention. Across the front yard about 100 feet away was hovering an egg-shaped object with a hole in the bottom tip from which were visible several white lights. She estimated the heigth of the object to be etween 15 and 20 feet. It was hovering above a large oak tree at the corner of their front yard.

Now quite frightened her fear spread to her younger sister who had not yet seen the object but sensed her older sister's anxiety. Nancy quickly thought of all she knew of UFOs: the TV talk show abductees and her older brother's tale of seeing a "football-field sized" craft. That's all it took to convince her that THEY were coming to get her and her little sister.

Nancy grabbed her 13 year old sister and rushed her towards the front door and into the house. Once in the house she glanced out the window for a split second and saw that it was moving towards the back of the house. She ran through the house trying to get someone's attention directed at the briskly moving object. Her final look at it lasted for approximately a minute and a half as she watched it move in a straight path towards Route 495. Then suddenly it popped out of sight "in a purple flash."

Was this some sort of rite of passage for a pubescent young girl? Could the ages of the two girls, the symbols of the rabbit, egg, and oak tree be telling us something? Or was this simply a coincidence of events imbued with meaning? Just a freak balloon whose appearance triggered a media induced cultural program of fear? Fear of the alien other that is Self?

In an effort to continue this line of Po logic I consulted someone versed in AmerIndian medicine card totem mythology. When I asked her about the totem for rabbit she informed me that this card's lesson dealt with confronting one's fears. The lesson is explored within a tale of a witch and a rabbit.

I paraphrase: Rabbit and witch were friends and rabbit would get hurt. Witch would heal him with magic. One day rabbit disappeared and witch went looking for him. When witch finds rabbit she is ignored by him. Rabbit finally admits to fearing witch's magic powers. Witch is so angry with rabbit that she curses him so that whatever rabbit feared would come to him and he would be forced to confront it. Rabbit feared eagle and so was confronted by eagle. Rabbit feared snake and so was confronted by snake. Rabbit feared boar and so was confronted by boar. And so on.

Does this literally mean that we are "rabbits" cursed by a magical feminine being to forever be confronted by our fears? What other meanings might UFOs Po Rabbits unlock? Let's look at the Irish legend of the Pookah:

"The pookah takes many forms, but is most famous when he appears as a giant, six-foot white rabbit - which is the form most Americans know from the play and film, Harvey. Whatever form the pookah takes, he retains the special ability of his species, which is like that of Thoth in Egyptian legend, Coyote in Native American myth or Hanuman the Divine Monkey in Hindu lore - he can move us from one universe, or Belief System, into another, and he likes to play games with our ideas about 'reality.''"

From Robert Anton Wilson's Cosmic Trigger Volume 2.

"Monsters as Teaching Mechanisms: The various "children of the night". . . may be peculiar elements in a teaching game, which a Higher Intelligence is utilizing to gradually alter our concepts of reality.

It was in my Mysteries of Time and Space that I first offered my Reality Game theory to explain such matters as UFOs, incredible archaeological artifacts, and the appearance of monsters. I noted that:


The Chinese soul is called p'o.

It may be that mankind has been invited to participate in a bizarre kind of contest with some undeclared cosmic opponents. Man may have been challenged to play the Reality Game; and if he can once apprehend the true significance of the preposterous clues, if he can but master the proper moves, he may obtain a clearer picture of his role in the cosmic sheme of things. The rules of the Reality Game may be confusing, extremely flexible and difficult to define, but play man must-for it is the only game in the Universe.

In the teasing fashion of a Zen riddle or a Sufi joke, I theorize a Higher Intelligence may use such highly improbable teaching aides as monster sightings to provoke us into a higher consciousness-and a much broader view of reality."

Within these speculative areas of research we shall see the multitude of potential non-human intelligences that may be speeking to us through the symbolicly garbed realms of our collective species consciousness and perhaps those of other terrestrial consciousness.