Radio Misterioso: Recent Episodes
Greg Bishop
In-depth conversations on the paranormal alternating with weird music. Occasionally live on Sundays 6-8 or 8-10 PM Pacific.
Due to be released in November, Dr. Diana Walsh-Pasulka’s second book on the UFO subject is to me is a portrait of the UFO phenomenon as manifested personally among those who are interested in the subject. In this way, it is more of a teaching text than a narrative, as her first volume, American Cosmic was. It examines personal truths about the direct experiences of those who do not get on the news or attend UFO conventions, and how this can tell us more about these encounters on an individual level, where I believe the best understanding of this mystery lies. It also stands as a snapshot of where the subject stands right now; how it is seen and internalized by witnesses, how it is mediated by those with agendas or misunderstandings, and how it might be eventually accessible to all to help us evolve and survive.
Diana spent many months talking to the people she profiles in Encounters. The result is a deep dive into not just the UFO subject, but a real look at the mindsets and approaches to those interested in examining this mystery. Her portrait of space psychologist Iya Whiteley is particularly fascinating, and reveals how carefully listening to the reports and emotions of astronauts and pilots not only saved countless lives, but could also revise the database on UFO reports. The “overview effect” experienced by many astronauts is particularly useful in this regard.
We talked about the need of the humanities and the sciences to look at the UFO subject on equal terms, and the importance of the oral transmission of information, rather than the written word, which is widely used and respected, especially in the space program. And surprisingly, the use of the technique among “invisible college” scientists and academics.
We also discussed another of the researchers in the book, who looks at AI not so much as a threat, but a chance to engage in a learning dialogue with a vast intelligence, and her view that it is an alien intelligence from the future, helping us to evolve into our next incarnation as a human species.
We end with quote from “Tyler D,” character from her first book and his advice about the UFO subject, which was that “We are not meant to figure it out.”
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I have known Thea Wirsching for a few months and my respect for her intellect and deep knowledge of tarot and astrology and their place in American History continues to amaze. Her advice and her singular project entitled the American Renaissance Tarot was one of the guides and inspirations for our own Ufology Tarot. She recently gave a fascinating lecture at the Philosophical Research Society about the esoteric roots of Edgar Allan Poe.
We talked about her path to her doctorate in English and her dissertation on the hermetic and the occult roots of American culture, particularly in the 19th century. In academia, she pointed out, “the occult is transgressive” and “conjures up the devil” for many, which made her degree more difficult to accomplish. She said that academics often “do not allow the subjects studied the dignity of their beliefs” and we talked about how this might be changing.
Thea mentioned the African American occultist Paschal Beverly Randolph and his influence on Aliester Crowley and that he quite possibly authored the first vampire novel. He was part of a very real and important brand of American hermeticism that influenced occult movements worldwide, and was disseminated through fiction and writers such as Melville, Hawthorne, Thoreau, Emerson, and Whitman and ended up in the teachings of Theosophy and the practice of Spiritualism (which itself was an American phenomenon which spread worldwide.) These authors and others, as well as significant figures from American history play important roles in the American Renaissance Tarot deck and book.
She emphasized that while U.S. history is filled with triumphs and horrors, that we must look at the negative as well as the positive in order to make peace with it and change for the better.
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Morgan Knudsen is on a mission to normalize what is commonly referred to as the “paranormal.” For over 20 years she has researched, experienced, and lectured and taught classes on hauntings and psychic functioning. She founded Entityseeker Paranormal Research & Teachings in 2003, co-hosts a podcast called Supernatural Circumstances, and has been featured on countless radio and television programs and has written two books: Teaching the Living, and The Gift of Instinct.
For this first RM show of 2023, we began with the inspiration of her great great grandfather Albert Durrant Watson, who was president of the Canadian Association of Psychical Research in the early 20th century. Morgan’s main goal is to let her audiences know that psychic events and abilities are normal and pervasive. She emphasized that, especially in this realm, we get and experience what we expect, adding, “If people could connect to this in a way that is beneficial, your life really does change.”
We spoke on how many paranormal events happen to people who don’t expect it or don’t care or just when they turn off equipment. Knudsen spoke about the “power of giving up,” adding, “As soon as you let go, you stop the resistance to what’s trying to happen.” She also surprised me with her take on the general reaction of her fellow Canadians towards these subjects, which tends to be conservative and almost dismissive.
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Chris Aubeck’s previous book, co-authored with Jacques Vallée, was entitled Wonders in the Sky, published in 2010. It was a comprehensive examination of aerial phenomena reports from antiquity to the year 1879. His new title is Alien Artifacts: From Antiquity to 1880: The Forgotten Story of How We Came to Believe in Visitors From the Stars. The book describes the long and intricate history of ideas about extraterrestrial worlds and their inhabitants. The examples stretch back to ancient Greece and include the first speculations on the origins of the ancient alien theory, the first ideas of extraterrestrial craft, original accounts of what we would know today as flying saucer contactees, and even the racist origins of ideas about superior beings. Chris says he’s been told that his research is “like drawing back a curtain to reveal a long forgotten history of an obsession we thought was new.”
In his first appearance on the show in over 6 years, Chris described his research into the history of ideas about extraterrestrials in archives. libraries, and the internet, and how he has discovered that “we’ve read so much into it based on our expectations.” Many UFO stories in the 19th century and before were invented as fiction or to sell newspapers and other printed media, but many of them contain quite modern elements, such as ideas about alien artifacts and writing, and even elements of abduction stories. Aubeck says that this is not proof that UFO sightings and encounters are made up, but that we need to look at cultural contexts and antecedents for them to gain perspective. We also discussed the writings of 18th century Swedish mystic Emanuel Swedenborg, and his descriptions of people from other planets that contain many elements that would appear in 20th century UFO contactee literature. Another fascinating tangent was the strange (to us) theory beginning in the 19th century, that meteorites had arrived from other worlds carrying flora and fauna, sometimes still living.
(Song credit: “They’re Here” by Boots Walker)
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Clas Svahn is a journalist by profession, and also the Chairman of the Archives For The Unexplained, located in Norrköping Sweden. The AFU is dedicated to collecting materials about UFOs, ufology, Forteana, cryptozoology, paranormal phenomena and folklore. It is a nonprofit foundation, and the collections comprise approximately 3.5 kilometers of shelf space in 15 different locations. The collections include over 55,000 books in various languages, 88,000 magazine issues representing 8,000 annual magazines, 650,000 newspaper clippings, 30,000 photographs, films, and tape, vinyl records, as well as memorabilia, scale models, paintings, paraphernalia, posters, clothes, toys, and other items.
Clas has written a book about the archives, entitled “Files of the Unexplained,” which is basically a tour of the archives and some of its rare and unusual holdings. We spoke about the beginnings of the archive, and how Svahn and his staff scour the globe for collections of books and other ephemera. He says he brings in about 2 tons of material every year. Svahn says he “doesn’t take no for an answer” when hunting down obscure material and has even retrieved material from dump sites after relatives told him they disposed of valuable collections. Amazingly, the AFU also holds records of the Scole experiment.
Svahn also told me that he spent a day with famous abductee Betty Hill and learned that she claimed to have seen a UFO crash years before her famous abduction and even to have picked up pieces of the craft.
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To me, Jeff Kripal’s new book, The Superhumanities is a call to action and a radical reassessment of not just the humanities, but what it means to be human and the potential of what it could mean. You cannot skim … Continue reading →
Dr. Michael Masters is a professor of biological anthropology at Montana Tech in Butte, Montana. His 2019 book was Identified Flying Objects: A Multidisciplinary Scientific Approach to the UFO Phenomenon, which hypothesized that ‘UFOs’ and ‘Aliens’ are our human descendants … Continue reading →
Joshua Cutchin’s new book Ecology of Souls: A New Mythology of Death & the Paranormal is a combination of “I knew that” and “How did I not know that?” for me. It seemed that rather than being a rare and … Continue reading →
I met remote viewing pioneer Paul Smith at the recent Archives of the Impossible conference in Houston, TX in March. We hit it off immediately and I suggested he come on RM. Smith has been teaching remote viewing (RV) techniques … Continue reading →
The interviews so far for our card project have concentrated on the Ufology” part of the process and philosophy of creating these images. In this interview, our resident tarot and occult expert and team member Susan Demeter joined Miguel Romero … Continue reading →
A small group has been working for over a year to bring a project to light, and it has finally appeared this week as the Ufology Tarot. This stems from an idea I had a few years ago to encode … Continue reading →
Jacobo Grinberg-Zylberbaum (1946-??) In 2019, I told my friend Miguel Romero about the little-known Mexican parapsychologist Dr. Jacobo Grinberg Zylberbaum, but we could find little about him online, except for a few sensationalized articles in Spanish. This year, a documentary … Continue reading →
It was suggested that I restart the “popup” idea in order to get back to posting shows more often. These programs are about 30 minutes in length and posted within a day of the interview. Susan‘s latest book is entitled … Continue reading →
Hello. Nice to see you again. In this interview with Tim Renner and Joshua Cutchin, we talk about the information and revelations in the second (and final) volume of their “Where the Footprints End” project examining the case for a … Continue reading →
Josh Cutchin and Tim Renner have just released a book that is designed (and sure) to goose the Bigfoot research community out of its “flesh-and-blood-hypothesis” stupor (the theory that the creature is an undiscovered primate.) In Where the Footprints End, … Continue reading →
Religious studies scholar Dr. Stephen Finley (Louisiana State University) is almost singular in his academic study of the UFO origins of the belief system of the Nation of Islam (NOI.) In the late 1980s, Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the … Continue reading →
Kevin Day has been interviewed and scrutinized endlessly by the UFO community. He was the Aerial Defense Matter expert and radar operator on the guided missile cruiser Princeton in early November of 2004, when the so-called “Nimitz UFO encounters” occurred. … Continue reading →
Shannon Taggart is an artist and photographer based in Brooklyn, New York. Her images have been exhibited and featured internationally, including in TIME, the New York Times Magazine, Discover, and Newsweek. We talked about the release of her photography book … Continue reading →
Michael Masters earned his doctorate in Anthropology in 2009 and is on the faculty of Montana Technological University. His specialty is in biological anthropology and evolutionary biology, specifically the study of fossil hominid skulls to trace trends in evolution as … Continue reading →
From March 10th to the 17th, I visited my friend Miguel Romero in Mexico City. At the suggestion of our friend David Metcalfe, we decided to conduct a live show from the condo where we were staying. Most of the … Continue reading →
I had the distinct pleasure of speaking with Whitley Strieber for the second time in as many months. The occasion was the release of his new book, entitled A New World. The work may be the most important in Strieber’s … Continue reading →
Susan and Massimo are amazing people. Both have been on the program before; Susan talking about her private research in parapsychological and UFO topics, and Dr. Massimo on his theories of possible sentient plasmas, which he has studied worldwide, including … Continue reading →
Prasad and Michio Kaku I’ll admit that I was not impressed with Deep Prasad when he burst on the UFO scene earlier this year. On Thanksgiving Day (in the U.S.) he tweeted a narrative about a very strange, vivid daytime … Continue reading →
Vassar College Religious Studies professor Christopher White’s book Other Worlds is a history of the western world’s search for extra dimensions and how it affected science, the arts, literature, and spirituality. Beginning with the relatively well-known 1884 book Flatland by … Continue reading →
The tradition continues with more Halloween weirdness courtesy of the ear and research of my friend Courtney. This year, we had a few more long-form songs and another dramatic reading, as well as some detailed background on some of the … Continue reading →
Alan Stivelman has created a film that shows a new way to examine the UFO subject and more importantly, the witness. Witness of Another World tells the story of Juan Pérez, an Argentinian gaucho who in 1978 at the age … Continue reading →
Anyone who listens to this show knows the work of Whitley Strieber. His 1987 book Communion was a watershed document that made millions aware of the phenomenon of UFO abductions. It defined and codified the experiences for thousands of people, … Continue reading →
Dr. Jeffrey J. Kripal holds the J. Newton Rayzor Chair in Philosophy and Religious Thought at Rice University. He is also the Associate Director of the Center for Theory and Research at the Esalen Institute. He has authored nine books … Continue reading →
Lifetime researcher Stanton T. Friedman passed away on May 13, 2019 after over 50 years of writing and lecturing. He was the public face of UFO study for those who knew little about the subject, and a mentor, inspiration, and … Continue reading →
Dr. Kevin Knuth is an Associate Professor in the Department of Physics at the University at Albany. He is a former NASA research scientist having worked for four years at Ames Research Center in the Intelligent Systems Division designing artificial … Continue reading →
Two weeks ago, I attended the very first Scientific Coalition for Ufology (SCU) conference in Huntsville, AL, just outside the gates of the historic Redstone Arsenal, one of the birthplaces of NASA. The SCU was formed in part to address … Continue reading →
I have known Paul Kimball and his brother for over a decade. In that time, I have worked with both of these talented guys on a few projects. The most popular of the programs from their production company is the … Continue reading →
Eric Wargo has written perhaps one of the most important popular science books in the last year. Time Loops proposes that future events can affect the past, and provides detailed descriptions of experimental findings that suggest (some would take it … Continue reading →
Binnall of America lives! This past Sunday, Tim and I continued the tradition and did a simulcast of our shows to examine and chew on all that has happened in the past 12 months. We spoke about how the TTSA … Continue reading →
The tradition continues! Courtney and I have scoured the history of Holiday music yet again to bring you the best of the strangest. Here’s the lineup for our 2018 extravaganza. Enjoy and have a great New Year! 1 – Billy … Continue reading →
Another visit to David Perkins’ home, another interview. Perkins has been studying the mutilation phenomenon longer than perhaps anyone in the world. Starting in the mid-1970s, he was performing field investigations and writing up his findings. Noted mutilation researcher and … Continue reading →
Dr. Massimo Teodorani is an astrophsyicist who uses his scientific expertise to examine issues of consciousness and its relation to the physical universe, as well as the implications of the observed properties of anomalous light phenomena (such as the Hessdalen … Continue reading →
Chris Lambright has written one of the only other books (besides mine and one by Greg Valdez) that deals with aspects of the Paul Bennewitz saga, which deal with issues of UFO researchers and what the military will do to … Continue reading →
The annual Radio Misterioso Halloween shows are turning into quite the extravaganza. Courtney “The Ear” O’Hearn once again helped choose the cream of the strange crop for this year’s show. We packed over 100 years of the creepy and unusual … Continue reading →
Over the past few years, by design or just by his continuous delving into the connection between anomalous experiences with apparent nonhuman entities and a certain nocturnal avian, Mike Clelland has become informally known in UFO circles as “The Owl … Continue reading →
Charles Topham has nothing to sell, no book to promote, not even a website. He simply has an interesting story with implications for all who look to the interactive relationship between human activity and consciousness and the vast subject we … Continue reading →
Jeremy Corbell’s upcoming film based on George Knapp’s groundbreaking book of the same name was the subject of our interview for this edition of Radio Misterioso. The film has generated a great deal of buzz because of the controversial subject. … Continue reading →
I’ve been getting requests for another music show and Josh was in town last weekend, so we recorded this one on my phone. Dropped the music in after the fact. A very fun show with one of my favorite guests, … Continue reading →
I finally met Chris Lambright at one of the Dulce Base conferences in New Mexico this year. Chris has been a researcher since the late 1970s, and is one of those people who do some of the most interesting and … Continue reading →
Joshua Cutchin‘s new book is his best yet, and deeply examines the ancient folklore surrounding children who are supposedly taken from their homes and parents by denizens of the “fairy realm.” Don’t make the mistake that he believes in a … Continue reading →
David Perkins (AKA “Izzy”) is known to many as Chris O’Brien’s longtime research partner (and “mentor” as O’Brien also refers to him.) Perkins began his interest in the cattle and livestock mutilation mystery from the beginnings of the phenomenon (ca. … Continue reading →
Chris was in Los Angeles last week after running video for the Contact In The Desert event over the previous weekend. I gave him a day to recover and then visited him where he was staying at a house on … Continue reading →
In this short but info-rich interview, Aaron and I started with a discussion about his excellent podcast “The Saucer Life,” which is one promising direction that podcasting seems to be heading: short, informative, and easy to understand for those not … Continue reading →
Shannon Taggart is a professional photographer who also captures images of the ineffable world of spiritualism. A visit to the Spiritualist community of Lilydale in upstate New York and an incredibly specific psychic reading started her on a years-long quest … Continue reading →
George Hansen is an almost mythical figure amongst those who have a deep interest in the issues discussed on this show. His groundbreaking book The Trickster and the Paranormal is required reading for anyone who wishes to tackle these subjects … Continue reading →
One day, we’ll get Miguel to write a book. He’s certainly heading in that direction as evidenced by this recent conversation on a variety of far-reaching subjects. As a writer for The Daily Grail, he searches out and reports/ comments … Continue reading →
Rosemary Ellen Guiley thinks she “came out of the womb writing” and enjoys the process of producing books, which is probably the first time any author has told me this. Guiley is a highly-regarded paranormal researcher with 65 books to … Continue reading →
I have been following the work of Dr. Dean Radin for over 20 years. In that time, I have been privileged to interview him twice. His new book Real Magic will be released just after this show posts and for … Continue reading →
Preston Dennett has been looking at UFO cases and interviewing witnesses for almost 30 years. In that time, he has interviewed hundreds (and maybe even thousands) of witnesses, investigated OBEs and even had his own close encounters. We began (as … Continue reading →
Longtime friend Nick Redfern joined me to talk about his new volume, The Slenderman Mysteries: An Internet Urban Legend Comes to Life. We caught up a bit on recent news and then dove in. The “Slenderman” was the result of … Continue reading →
Researcher Peter Robbins is perhaps best known for his book Left At East Gate, which was enveloped in a controversy that led to a painful process that ended in Robbins disowning the work. He has discussed the issues surrounding this … Continue reading →
This was another fun and informative conversation with a researcher who has actually applied some of the methods we have talked about on this show for awhile now. We spent the first part of the program discussing witness-centered anomalies study, … Continue reading →
David Metcalfe is a researcher, writer and multimedia specialist focusing on the interrelationship of media, culture, and consciousness. We began the conversation with his deep study of the Santa Muerte belief and its role as an alternative to people who … Continue reading →
My longtime friend Courtney is becoming our resident weird music guru. Just in time for the holiday, we present our “anti-Valentine’s Day” show, featuring murder ballads, breakup songs, songs of frustration and unrequited love, and pure bitching about the opposite … Continue reading →
My long-time friend, amazing author, and Fortean Skylaire Alfvegren joined me in a very informal talk about subjects of mutual interest. The interview occurred right around the time of the most devastating fires around Los Angeles and Southern California. We … Continue reading →
Joshua Cutchin has recently completed a manuscript with the working title Thieves In The Night: Paranormal Child Abduction From the Faerie Faith to the UFO Era, due for publication in the next few months. For some reason, we started with … Continue reading →
(cover design by Red Pill Junkie) Gorightly and I are finishing up a detailed chronicle of UFO contact personalities and cults (entitled A Is For Adamski) which will be released in the next couple of months. It will be a … Continue reading →
In what has become a tradition, longtime RM friend Tim Binnall joined me for a year-in-review simulcast. Tim gathers and writes some of the news for the Coast To Coast website, so he’s been on top of all the weirdness … Continue reading →
After our successful Halloween music show, Courtney and I planned this extravaganza. We both cannot take this holiday season seriously, and it shows in our selection of mostly disrespectful tunes. One is VERY disrespectful and very NSFW or mixed company … Continue reading →
Dr. Diana Walsh-Pasulka has just finished what will likely be a groundbreaking book on the UFO subject, which will be released in the spring of 2018. American Cosmic tells the story of her journey from religious scholarship to a seat … Continue reading →
After the successful run of the program Ghost Cases seven years ago, Paul Kimball was tapped to produce an entirely new series (Haunted) with the same co-host. Using what they learned in the last program, Paul and his ghost-hunting partner … Continue reading →
As many of you may know, Rich and I have been friends for over 25 years. He recently went through a bout with cancer, and we thought a house visit while he recuperates was a good excuse for recording a … Continue reading →
The last time Jeff Ritzmann was on the show, he briefly described how almost anyone could initiate their own paranormal (specifically UFO-related) encounter. I wanted him to get more specific, but we ran out of time. This time, he not … Continue reading →
Erica Lukes has had her own UFO experiences, been through the MUFON wringer as an official for the organization, and conducted original field research over many years, as well as hosting the UFO Classified interview program. On the day that … Continue reading →
Courtney is a long-time friend who shares an interest in strange music, and we’ve been pushing each other to discover ever more wonderful and obscure sounds and ideas for many years. We gathered lists of our favorite out-there Halloween songs … Continue reading →
Kenn Thomas was in town for the last few days, so we took an hour to make a short “pop-up” interview about the impending release on October 26th of the (supposedly) last secret government files on the JFK assassination. Kenn … Continue reading →
Another in our occasional discussions of the book UFOs: Reframing the Debate was conducted at a park and in a pub in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. I was visiting for a few days and both Susan and Robert were amazing hosts … Continue reading →
When Royce Myers went to a UFO convention in the early 1990s, Mexican UFO promoter Jaime Maussan informed him that stars were parts of vast alien “motherships,” which were moving slowly across the sky every night. This (and other experiences) … Continue reading →
Time to catch up with Tim Binnall of Binnall of America and a long time friend and supporter of this show. This program was recorded in early August, before fugitive and itinerant psychic and scam artist Sean David Morton was … Continue reading →
My longtime friend Miles Lewis and I always have lots to talk about. This time, we started out with a story I read recently that dealt with people taking megadoses (meaning 1000x the normal amount) of LSD and how they … Continue reading →
What do ghosts and UFOs have in common? That’s not a setup to a joke, as we found out at the third annual East Coast Paraconference, which took place in the lovely town of Liverpool, Nova Scotia over the weekend … Continue reading →
This year during the Roswell festival, I was privileged to have dinner with James Clarkson and his wife Joanne. I found them charming and intelligent, and with a lot to say about the state of UFO research. Clarkson recently quit … Continue reading →
Two weeks ago, I gathered together a group of friends in our hotel room at Roswell, where the 70th anniversary festivities had just concluded. I was joined by Peter Robbins, Jack Brewer, Nick Redfern, Miles Lewis, and Adam Sayne to … Continue reading →
Last Sunday, I wasn’t planning to to record a live show, mainly because I was all the way out in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada attending researcher/ writer/ filmmaker and friend Paul Kimball’s wedding. Since he wasn’t leaving on a honeymoon … Continue reading →
During the upset in the ranks of MUFON a couple of weeks ago, I noticed that researcher Lon Strickler had taken the lead in exposing the strange and vicious racist comments of one of the organization’s inner circle. We started … Continue reading →
Susan Demeter-St.Clair, Miles Lewis, and Miguel “Red Pill Junkie” Romero joined me for the first in a series of discussions with the authors of this recently published book. For the first hour or so, we kicked around ideas and themes … Continue reading →
On Saturday, May 27th, a new book entitled UFOs: Reframing the Debate was released. Fourteen writers (including myself) are featured therein, with essays on everything from UFO study as a religion, to the changing definitions and methods of scientific inquiry, … Continue reading →
The film Arrival, based on the novella “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang has already achieved legendary status. Both the film and story explore ideas of time, language, communication, and alien life. Since these are themes dear to this … Continue reading →
In 2005, Nick Redfern released Bodysnatchers in the Desert to a storm of shock, controversy, and whining. It took the Roswell story and turned it on its head be suggesting that the events of 1947 were caused by the failure … Continue reading →
Susan Demeter-St.Clair came to my attention by way of the forthcoming book wherein we are both featured authors. Demeter-St.Clair argues that the high-strange aspects of UFO (and other) encounters, in addition to perceived psychic phenomena are the path to a more rich understanding of this part of human experience.
Susan can trace her own weird experiences back to childhood, and we spoke about her sightings of little figures that resembled elves, and her later perceptions of a wolf entity that seemed to comfort her. The encounters ended when she became a teenager and then came flooding back in the form of an unequivocal UFO sighting when she was 23 years old. She feels that this background helps her when interviewing witnesses, since she can empathize with their plight and put people at ease so more of their story can be told. We both agreed that researchers need to engage with the phenomenon in some way for any progress to be made.
She lamented the ghost research community’s fixation on the “DPH” (Dead People Hypothesis) which she thinks is just as limiting as the ETH (ExtraTerrestrial Hypothesis) in the search for understanding and possible breakthroughs. We also talked about the late Jim Moseley and loss of his sense of humor in the UFO field. We also agreed that peer review in UFO study seems to consist mostly of online troll attacks.
Photo: Susan in Los Angeles at an exhibit on Alchemy.
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Based on an interview I conducted with my longtime friend Mike Marinacci in early 2105, I was contacted by a representative from Ronin Press about him possibly writing a book consisting of the entries from his Caifia’s Children blog. Fast forward to 2017, and the wonderful California Jesus has just been released.
We spoke about this genesis and the weird characters who have arrived in California over the past couple of centuries to peddle their brands of Christianity, which have ranged from the simply strange to the downright frightening and even illegal. William Monéy, the man who published the first English language book in Los Angeles (with a Spanish translation alongside the text) also performed such stunts as having himself buried alive to prove his faith and religious authority. (He screamed immediately to be let out as the dirt fell on top of the box he was in.)
We also examined the birth of the modern Pentecostal movement in a small house near present-day downtown L.A., Bebe and Thomas Patten, upon whom later televangelists modeled their acts (Thomas berated parishoners for large donations and then said that the Almighty wanted him and his wife to have a big house and shiny new cars) and even the scandal-ridden life of Thomas Jeffers, who was involved with white supremacist groups, weird (for the time) sex scandals, and who spent his life in and out of jail cells.
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Due to negative comments about a recent show, I felt obligated to examine a few issues with this program. The gist of the comments were that Radio Misterioso was “unprofessional” and should beware of interviewing friends, so of course I had to get a couple of friends (Josh Cutchin and RPJ) on the program to discuss any merit to the criticism. The main point was that podcasting is not broadcasting, and that the audience for a podcast is interested in hearing a conversation rather than a formal interview. Josh pointed out that Radio Misterioso is a bit of an echo chamber, which is fair and which I shall remedy.
We moved on to a discussion of how to democratize UFO and anomalies study, and how the internet has become perhaps the most insidious echo chamber. We also discussed how a talk on Roswell could bring anything new to the table with some interesting suggestions from both guests. Echo chambers within echo chambers!
Photo: Cutchin and RPJ appear in public together.
From April 6th to the 9th, a small group meet called “Paramania” was held in Los Angeles. Fans of Radio Misterioso and Tim Binnall’s Binnall of America podcasts gathered to listen to short presentations and tour the L.A. area. The motto of Paramania is “We promise nothing,” because there are no guarantees except that people will be able to meet and talk to each other and a few authors and researchers who may attend.
I hosted this years meeting and 15 people showed up from all areas of the country and even one (Red Pill Junkie) from Mexico. On the final evening, we gathered in listener Steve Ray’s hotel room to broadcast a live program. The participants discussed tulpas, the secret space program (with author Walter Bosley, who was with us) as well as online questions from the audience. One of the group (Zach Copley) had left for home already, but in a first for Radio Misterioso (and perhaps in podcasting) he listened to and then called in to the program from 30,000 feet using the wifi signal on the airplane.
There was drinking and revelry, but also some interesting and intelligent conversation, which is what happens when you get a group like this together. Please inquire at the RM Facebook page if you are interested in being added to the group list. Much filtering and editing was required to get this recording into a format that was acceptable, so please excuse any technical issues.
I’ve been aware of MJ for a couple of years now, but on the occasion of the upcoming May release of UFOs – Reframing the Debate, a book in which we are both featured, we started to talk and decided an interview was inevitable.
F0r the first 20 minutes of the conversation, we actually discussed issues with my Co-creation hypothesis idea, and MJ pointed out some issues with my nascent theorizing. He correctly remarks that it attempts to bridge the gap between the ET hypothesis and the so-called Psycho-Social hypothesis of UFOs.
MJ is actually an investigator for MUFON in Canada and he discussed the value in talking to witnesses and the frustration he has with the organization, particularly the paperwork, which he sees as restrictive. We also delved into the idea that UFO study is philosophically different than other paranormal pursuits such as cryptozoology and ghost hunting in that the entities behind it (if there indeed are any) are in a different category. As he put it, “Aliens can take over the world, Bigfoot and ghosts cannot.”
Ever since my conversation (with Jeremy Vaeni and Tyler Kokjohn) about the singular Project CORE, I knew that Jeff Ritzmann was someone that didn’t just complain about the state of research, but was actually taking active steps to delve into some of the more unhrealded and esoteric areas of UFO study. I was recently reminded about his new endeavour (Project Oculus) which attempts to document strange lights and other goings-on in his home.
We spoke about the aims of CORE (such as asking supposed abductees different questions than usual, for example “what was your life situation before and after your experience”) and the difficulty of describing your position on these subjects to most people once you get beyond a certain point in your studies. Jeff also discussed his concept of paranormal experiences occurring in “liminal” spaces and periods – Places and times that are transitions from one state to another. He believes the best way to stop unwanted encounters with strangeness is to make your life as routine and predictable as possible: The normal is anathema to the paranormal.
We also delved into Oculus and what he hopes to accomplish with the project. At the end of the program, Jeff described how to possibly create your own UFO sighting (or perhaps something similar) but warned that people should probably not try it.
Chris may hold the record for most appearances on Radio Misterioso, dating back over 10 years. Since that first talk, we have become friends, mainly because he refuses to be pigeonholed as a researcher or in his opinions.
He described the UFO tours he conducts in the Sedona area, and although he guarantees nothing, says that about 1/5 of the tours actually result in apparent sightings of unexplained aerial phenomena. He described his approach to the tours and how he “deprograms” his audience about what they think UFOs might be.
We spoke about language, culture, and media and how it affects what people think they see and experience during a paranormal encounter. He also mentioned his theory that UFO activity seems to increase in this country during military drawdowns and when the party in the Oval Office changes. Also discussed: How we could possibly put ourselves in a state of mind to experience the paranormal, the futility of trying to explain where a researcher may be coming from, and a strange cattle mutilation that occurred close to a rancher’s home while he was watching a herd slowly circle something in a pasture. As always, a great “inside baseball”- type talk with an experienced researcher and author.
Photo: Chris grabs my drone out of the air near Sedona, AZ.
David Weatherly is known as an investigator with a wide-range of interests and expertise. We met last year at the International UFO Conference and found that we had similar views on many paranormal topics. What I admired about him was that he seemed to have no set agenda and had no problem discussing any theory or idea. He is perhaps best known for his book The Black Eyed Children. It is because of this that we didn’t mention the subject at all. He also written other books on paranormal entities and publishes a Bigfoot studies journal called Woodknocks. His newest, Haunted Toys, was released last month.
We sat in a couple of comfy chairs in my room at this year’s conference and explored ideas about manifested thoughtforms (also known by their Tibetan name: tulpas) the Philip experiment, bigfoot as a physical being with paranormal abilities (something I hadn’t considered before) and his investigations of ghostly disturbances at the Ripley Museum in Florida. He is as thoughtful and non-dogmatic as they come in this field, and that is rare.
Photo: David at the Travis Walton phone booth near Heber, Arizona.
My first and only (so far) in-studio interview at my new place (my desk at home) was with Aaron Dabbah (also known as “EsoterX.”) As I say somewhere in this program, his writing makes me feel like I am learning about something that I don’t want to. In this episode, we talked about folklore as an early warning system, skeptics vs. believers (who often have the same ego motivations for their opinions) and the “phantom clown” phenomenon considered as a chaotic trickster manifestation (such as the mudhead kachina pictured above.) Later in the program, we took an extended sidetrack into writers whom we admire. He lives in town, so we’ll be talking again soon.
The post title refers to Aaron’s contention that if we weren’t supposed to see paranormal things, then the ability should have been evolved out of our brains by now.