Walk into a modern UAP conference and there is a decent chance you will see Alan Steinfeld somewhere near the front of the room. He might be on stage moderating a panel about non-human intelligences, quietly filming an interview for his long running New Realities channel, or speaking about what he calls humanity’s “galactic identity”.
At the 2023 San Diego UAP gathering, KPBS cameras caught him describing the moment this way: “We are at the threshold of a new time, possibly a new awakening of who we are to the rest of the cosmos.” (KPBS Public Media)
For more than three decades Steinfeld has used television, books, film and conferences to argue that UAP phenomena are not only real but deeply entangled with consciousness itself.
Alan Steinfeld and Russell Targ during preparations for a New Realities show circa 1994 (Courtesy A. Steinfeld)
Early life and first encounters
Conference biographies for New Living Expo state that he “has been involved with Disclosure since his experiences as a young child” and that from those early events he concluded that humanity would only accept we are not alone if we learned to “shift our worldview about what we think is possible”. (New Living Expo)
In later interviews, including conversations around his book Making Contact: Preparing for the New Realities of Extraterrestrial Existence, Steinfeld alludes to early encounters with what he interprets as non-human intelligences. Promotional material for one television interview notes that “since childhood he has experienced ET realities”. (YouTube)
For UAPedia purposes, these formative contact narratives sit in the category of experiencer testimony rather than documented incident reports. There are no publicly available police records, radar logs or contemporaneous medical files linked to those childhood episodes. The impact, however, appears decisive. Nearly every later biography frames his career as a direct outgrowth of those early encounters and of a lifelong feeling that consciousness is larger than the human brain. (Evolutionary Leaders)
Building “New Realities”
If Steinfeld has a legacy project, it is New Realities.
According to the official site, he founded New Realities in the mid-1990s as a Manhattan cable program that offered “a vibrant alternative to the mainstream” and focused on consciousness, spirituality and the then emerging UAP wave. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown) Over time it migrated online and grew into a substantial YouTube presence with more than 90,000 subscribers and tens of millions of views, featuring over 2,500 interviews. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
The guests map out Steinfeld’s ecosystem. New Realities has hosted wellness and consciousness figures such as Deepak Chopra, Marianne Williamson, Bruce Lipton, Lynne McTaggart, Joe Dispenza and visionary artist Alex Grey, alongside a long list of UAP researchers and experiencers. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
The Hollywood Disclosure Alliance profile of Steinfeld notes that New Realities has included interviews with Budd Hopkins, John Mack, Richard Dolan, Danny Sheehan, Steve Bassett, Kathleen Marden and many other UAP focused thinkers. (Hollywood Disclosure Alliance) These names alone are a roll call of late twentieth and early twenty first century abduction research, disclosure activism and experiencer advocacy.
On the production side, Steinfeld has not limited himself to UAP specific guests. His programming weaves together UAP sightings, abduction narratives, remote viewing research, near death experiences and esoteric philosophies. This cross pollination has helped normalize UAP as one strand in a broader “consciousness exploration” narrative, particularly for audiences who first arrived via New Age, healing, or human potential interests.
For UAPedia’s taxonomy, New Realities qualifies as a long running independent media project that amplifies UAP related claims from a wide spectrum of experiencers, researchers and channelers. Its evidentiary role is primarily archival and testimonial, not empirical in the radar or sensor data sense, but historically important in documenting how the community has talked about contact.
Books, essays and the Making Contact project
“Making Contact”
Steinfeld’s most visible UAP related publication is Making Contact: Preparing for the New Realities of Extraterrestrial Existence, released in 2021 by St. Martin’s Essentials, an imprint of Macmillan. (Amazon)
Making Contact debuted as a best seller on Amazon all three categories , print, digital and audio and won the 2023 Conscious Life Book Award. Making Contact has been praised by such people as Deepak Chopra, JJ Hurtak, Russell Targ, Jaques Vallee, Linda Moulton Howe and Nick Pope.
The book is not a single authored treatise but a curated anthology. Descriptions from the publisher and library catalogs emphasize that Steinfeld assembled original essays from prominent UAP researchers and experiencers to create a “framework for understanding what ‘making contact’ with extraterrestrials could mean for the future of humanity”. (Macmillan Publishers)
Alan Steinfeld at a book signing at SpiritWay Wellness in Eagle-Vail in 2022 (Courtesy A. Steinfeld)
Contributors include:
Nick Pope, former UK Ministry of Defence UAP desk officer
Grant Cameron, researcher on UAP and the American presidency
Dr J. J. and Dr Desiree Hurtak, futurists and founders of the Academy for Future Science
Linda Moulton Howe, long time investigator of anomalous cattle deaths and UAP cases
Dr John Mack, the late Harvard psychiatrist who investigated abduction narratives
Steinfeld contributes an extended introduction and his own essay and stitches the sections together in a narrative arc that runs from sightings and government secrecy to consciousness, telepathy and the psychological impact of contact. (Colorado Mountain College)
The book debuted as an Amazon best seller in its category and received endorsements from media figures such as George Noory and Deepak Chopra, who framed it as part of a needed “new story” about Earth’s place in its cosmic environment. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
Critical reception has been mixed. Veteran space journalist Leonard David praised the ambition but described the conceptual “scaffolding” around the topic as “pretty wobbly” in places, reflecting the uneven empirical grounding across contributions. (Leonard David) A detailed community review on Reddit’s r/UFOs forum similarly found the overall message to boil down to “keep an open mind”, with some chapters regarded as stronger than others. (Reddit) Goodreads ratings cluster in the middle, suggesting that even sympathetic UAP readers see Making Contact more as an overview of diverse perspectives than a definitive evidence synthesis. (Goodreads)
From a UAPedia claims perspective, Making Contact is best categorized as:
Evidentiary type: anthology of expert and experiencer interpretations
Strength: uneven, ranging from archival value (Mack) to speculative metaphysics (channeling, telepathy)
Impact: high in shaping how lay audiences frame “contact” as a psychological and spiritual process rather than only a technological one
Other publications
Before Making Contact, Steinfeld authored Careers in Alternative Medicine, a guide to holistic health professions now in its third edition. (Evolutionary Leaders) While not directly about UAP, it reflects his long standing interest in non conventional healing, which later overlaps with experiencer support, trauma healing and altered states work within the UAP community.
He has contributed articles on arts, metaphysics and UAP related topics to publications such as the New York Sun, New Life Magazine, The Golden Thread and American Book Review. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
Film, art and the visual language of contact
Steinfeld’s creative career began in the arts and independent film. His short narrative film Never Wear a Dead Man’s Shoes and the documentary A Walking Tour of the East Village 1985 were both screened at notable venues, with the latter receiving a week-long run at New York’s Museum of Modern Art. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
These works examined subcultures, shifting cityscapes and the tension between gentrification and artistic expression. Steinfeld also exhibited experimental photography, including portraits of figures such as Mick Jagger and Andy Warhol, which explored what he describes as “place and presence” through layered imagery. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
In the explicitly UAP domain, he served as executive producer for two feature length documentaries: The Hidden Hand by James Carman and Calling All Earthlings by Jonathan Berman. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
The Hidden Hand surveys abduction narratives, alleged cover ups and the human response to contact.
Calling All Earthlings focuses on George Van Tassel and the Integratron, blending UAP contactee history with mid century desert counterculture.
These films extend Steinfeld’s larger project: giving a platform to people who claim direct contact experiences and positioning their stories within a broader cultural transformation.
Organizational roles and networks
Steinfeld is embedded in a dense web of organizations at the intersection of consciousness studies and anomalous phenomena. The Evolutionary Leaders network lists him as:
Board member of The Friends of the Institute of Noetic Sciences (FIONS)
Vice President of the Association of Psychotherapy and Spirituality
Representative to the United Nations for the Academy for Future Science
The Institute of Noetic Sciences, founded by astronaut Edgar Mitchell, researches consciousness and psi phenomena; FIONS functions as its New York based support organization. Steinfeld’s board role places him squarely in the community that treats psi, remote viewing and anomalous experiences as legitimate subjects of scientific inquiry.
He is also listed as faculty for The Shift Network, where he teaches about contact and consciousness, and as a profiled speaker for events such as New Living Expo and Sedona Ascension Retreats. (The Shift Network)
In 2025 and 2026, UAP focused conferences and digital events (including UAPCon) showcased Steinfeld as both speaker and moderator, describing him as a “leading voice in the field of UAP studies and non human intelligence” and highlighting his long experience emceeing Contact in the Desert, often marketed as the largest UAP themed event in the world. (UAPCon – Unlocking New Realities)
These roles matter because they position Steinfeld not only as a commentator but as a gatekeeper. He helps decide which voices reach large live and online audiences in the emerging high production UAP conference circuit.
Public appearances and media footprint
Steinfeld’s media presence spans several decades and formats:
Guest on programs such as Coast to Coast AM, Fade to Black and numerous podcasts discussing UAP, remote viewing and consciousness. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
Interview subject for mainstream outlets including public media station KPBS at a San Diego UAP conference. (KPBS Public Media)
Podcasts and long form interviews
Featured guest on Michael Shermer’s Skeptic podcast to discuss how believers and skeptics think about UAP, illustrating his willingness to engage critically minded audiences. (Skeptic)
Multiple appearances on New Thinking Allowed, including a 2023 episode dedicated to “Contacting Aliens” where he outlines his views on evolutionary consciousness and UAP. (The New Thinking Allowed Foundation)
Frequent conversations on spiritual and paranormal podcasts that tie UAP to wider questions about life after death, psi and non local mind. (New Dimensions Radio)
Presenter at New Living Expo, Sedona Ascension Retreats, Portal to Ascension events and regional MUFON gatherings. (New Living Expo)
Through this steady visibility, Steinfeld has become a recognizable “face” of the UAP contact conversation, especially in venues where spirituality and anomalous phenomena intersect.
Known associates within the UAP ecosystem
Steinfeld’s collaborators and frequent guests map cleanly onto UAPedia’s network of key figures. Some of the most relevant include:
Abduction and contact researchers
Budd Hopkins, painter and pioneering abduction investigator
Dr John Mack, Harvard psychiatrist who framed abduction as a transformative experience
Mary Rodwell, regressionist working with “star seed” contactees
Investigative journalists and analysts
Linda Moulton Howe, known for cattle mutilation investigations and Ancient Aliens appearances
Richard Dolan, historian of UAP secrecy and geopolitics
Nick Pope, former UK Ministry of Defence UAP investigator
Disclosure and policy advocates
Steve Bassett, lobbyist and founder of the Paradigm Research Group
Danny Sheehan, constitutional attorney involved in high profile UAP related cases
Consciousness and contact oriented figures
Dr J. J. and Dr Desiree Hurtak, founders of the Academy for Future Science
Caroline Cory, filmmaker and consciousness researcher
This constellation reflects Steinfeld’s position inside the “experiencer and consciousness” wing of UAP studies, rather than the purely nuts and bolts aerospace or sensor analysis community.
Core claims and philosophical stance
Across his media work, books and conference talks, several recurring claims define Steinfeld’s contribution to UAP discourse.
UAP contact is real and ongoing
In both Making Contact and public talks, Steinfeld states that UAP craft and their occupants are actively engaging humanity. (Macmillan Publishers)
He treats abduction accounts, CE-5 style contact attempts and psychic communication as parts of a single phenomenon involving non human intelligences.
Consciousness is the key interface for contact
He argues that direct contact with non human intelligences requires what he calls a “multi layered sensibility” and expanded consciousness, not only better telescopes. (Reddit)
Steinfeld teaches remote viewing, crediting Russell Targ’s protocols, and encourages meditation and altered states as ways to tune into non local mind where contact can occur. (The New Thinking Allowed Foundation)
Disclosure is primarily “an inside job”
Conference bios quote him as saying that Disclosure is an internal process: humanity must awaken to its nature as a “galactic” species before open contact is possible. (New Living Expo)
He welcomes government releases of UAP videos and hearings but treats them as late confirmations of what experiencers have reported for decades. (KPBS Public Media)
Government and military actors have concealed the extent of contact
Making Contact opens with chapters on craft and cover up, and the book’s marketing explicitly references government secrecy. (Colorado Mountain College)
In interviews, including New Thinking Allowed, he speaks about historical suppression, aligning with other disclosure advocates. (The New Thinking Allowed Foundation)
Within UAPedia’s claims taxonomy, these positions score as:
Experiential and interpretive claims supported primarily by testimony, consciousness research and qualitative narratives.
Minimal reliance on primary sensor data or declassified government case files, though government reports are used to show that UAP are taken seriously within official structures.
Controversies and criticisms
Steinfeld has not been the subject of major personal scandals, but his work sits in contested territory and attracts several lines of critique.
Methodological concerns
Skeptical commentators argue that the mix of channeling, remote viewing and subjective experiences in his programming blurs the boundary between evidence and interpretation. The Skeptic podcast episode with Michael Shermer explicitly frames the conversation as a respectful clash between scientific skepticism and Steinfeld’s openness to UAP contact. (Skeptic)
Blending spirituality and empirical claims
Steinfeld’s insistence that alien contact can awaken humans to their “divinity” and facilitate an evolutionary leap causes discomfort among researchers who prefer to keep religious or spiritual interpretations separate from the data. (The New Thinking Allowed Foundation)
Association with controversial figures
His platforming of channelers, radical contact claims and personalities who have themselves been heavily criticized (for example, some New Age health and consciousness promoters) leads some in the evidence focused UAP research world to view New Realities as insufficiently discriminating. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
From a UAPedia standpoint, these controversies mostly concern epistemology rather than ethics. They highlight real tensions between different approaches inside the field: data driven analysis, experiencer advocacy and metaphysical exploration.
Impact on UAP culture and discourse
Even critics often concede Steinfeld’s influence. Several impact vectors stand out.
Media amplification of experiencer voices
By interviewing thousands of guests over decades, New Realities has preserved an audio visual archive of experiencer and researcher testimony that might otherwise have been scattered across small conferences and local support groups. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
Impact speculation label: High cultural impact, archival value.
Bridging consciousness research and UAP studies
Through his roles with FIONS, the Academy for Future Science and his own teaching on remote viewing, Steinfeld has been a persistent connector between psi researchers, spiritual teachers and UAP experiencers. (Evolutionary Leaders)
Impact speculation label: Moderate to high, polarizing among empiricists.
Framing Disclosure as psychological and spiritual preparation
Making Contact and related talks have popularized the idea that UAP disclosure is not only about releasing documents but about expanding human identity, a narrative now common in many contact oriented groups. (Macmillan Publishers)
Impact speculation label: Emergent, potentially civilizational if claims of contact are validated.
Influence on conference culture
As a recurring emcee at major UAP and “ascension” events, Steinfeld influences how panels are structured, which topics get spotlighted and how contentious issues like abductions, non human intelligence motives and government secrecy are framed in front of large audiences. (Macmillan Publishers)
Impact speculation label: High within the experiencer and spiritual contact subculture; low in mainstream policy circles.
Claims taxonomy snapshot
Key Steinfeld related claims as they pertain to UAPedia’s conceptual framework:
Claim: Non human intelligences are interacting with humanity through UAP encounters and multi dimensional contact.
Evidence: Experiencer testimony, abduction research tradition, channeled material, interpretive synthesis in Making Contact. (Colorado Mountain College)
Classification: High impact, experientially sourced, largely speculative from a conventional scientific standpoint.
Claim: Expanding human consciousness is a precondition for open contact.
Evidence: Philosophical argumentation, personal experiences, remote viewing practice, cross referencing spiritual traditions. (The New Thinking Allowed Foundation)
Classification: Interpretive, metaphysical; not directly testable in current empirical frameworks.
Claim: Governments have suppressed or minimized the reality of UAP contact for decades.
Evidence: Historical patterns of ridicule, whistleblower accounts and declassified cases referenced in essays by contributors like Nick Pope and Grant Cameron. (Colorado Mountain College)
Classification: Mixed; some elements supported by documentary history of secrecy, others remain conjectural, especially regarding motives and scope.
Claim: UAP experiences can catalyze healing, creativity and a positive transformation of human civilization.
Evidence: Qualitative reports from experiencers, parallels with near death and mystical experiences, therapeutic narratives in conferences and interviews. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
Classification: Plausible but anecdotal; requires systematic study of long term experiencer outcomes.
Work history and skills beyond UAP
Steinfeld’s career is unusually hybrid. Documented roles include:
Event producer for gatherings such as The Water Forum (bringing Masaru Emoto to New York), Crystal Skull 10:10:10 celebration, and various spiritual film festivals. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
Licensed acupuncturist with a master’s degree in Chinese Medicine, practicing and teaching in parallel with media work. (New Realities – Making Known the Unknown)
Board and representative roles at FIONS, Association of Psychotherapy and Spirituality and the Academy for Future Science. (Evolutionary Leaders)
This blend of healing arts, media production and spiritual event organizing has given him an unusual skill set for the UAP space: he can talk comfortably with contactees about trauma and integration, operate cameras and edit footage, and navigate NGO style diplomacy at United Nations related events.
Implications
Alan Steinfeld occupies a liminal position in the UAP landscape. He is not a whistleblower, a government insider or a data analyst. Instead he functions as a cultural mediator and amplifier, particularly for those who understand UAP as a catalyst for consciousness evolution.
If future research strengthens the case that some UAP experiences involve non human intelligence and that altered states play a role in that interaction, Steinfeld’s decades of work documenting experiencer narratives, promoting remote viewing and building bridges between psi research and UAP will look prescient.
If, conversely, UAP turns out to be predominantly advanced human technology or misunderstood natural phenomena, his legacy may be reassessed more as a chronicler of late twentieth and early twenty first century spiritual culture than as a direct contributor to UAP Studies.
Either way, UAPedia records him as a central node in the “experiencer and consciousness” branch of the field: a broadcaster who has spent much of his life asking humanity to consider the possibility that the visitors are already here, waiting for us to recognize them in the mirror of our own expanded minds.
Alan Steinfeld, New Realities, Making Contact book, UAP contact, non human intelligence, UAP disclosure, UAP experiencer community, Institute of Noetic Sciences, Academy for Future Science, remote viewing and UAP, UAP conferences, Contact in the Desert, consciousness and UAP, extraterrestrial existence, Alan Steinfeld biography.
If you wanted to build the simplest possible “ancient UAP” object, you would not start with a flying disk or a chariot of fire. You would start with a stone.
Not just any stone, either, but a stone with a biography: it arrives from above, it radiates authority, it attracts pilgrims, it reorganizes economies, and it causes political actors to behave as if a non-human presence has entered the local power grid.
In the ancient Mediterranean and Near East, that stone has a name family: baetyl / baitylos / betyl. In modern scholarship, “baetyl” often functions as a broad label for sacred stones, sometimes explicitly described as “fallen from heaven” and sometimes treated as a “house of the god.”
UAPedia’s angle here is not to retrofit every sacred rock into a spacecraft. Instead, we take a data-first approach: isolate the recurring features of baetyl narratives, track them across cultures and centuries, and ask what that persistence implies about the phenomenon that generated the stories, the rituals, and the after-effects.
The baetyl pattern, defined as data
Across sources, baetyl narratives cluster around a repeatable package of claims:
Anomalous provenance: “sent from heaven” or “fallen from the sky.”
Aniconic embodiment: the divine is present without a human-shaped statue often as a cone, block, or rounded stone.
Handled like a device: carried in procession, housed in a restricted sanctuary, “activated” via oiling/anointing, draped/covered, placed on a chariot, or installed in a niche.
Interpretation of “features”: observers point to markings, projections, sheen, or color as meaningful signs (sun-symbols, divine signatures).
After-effects: pilgrimage economies, legitimacy for rulers, social conflict, iconoclasm, and long-lived cult continuity.
That combination is why baetyls matter for UAP studies. They are not just “belief objects.” They are historical interfaces: touchpoints where communities insist that something non-ordinary arrived from “above” and stayed.
A compact dataset of well-attested baetyl cases
Below is a small, conservative dataset limited to cases anchored in widely cited ancient testimony, archaeology, or sustained religious practice.
Case
Location / culture
“From heaven” language
Object form
Sources / anchors
Noted after-effects
Elagabal’s sacred stone
Emesa (Homs), Syria → Rome
Explicit
Black conical stone
Herodian/Cassius Dio tradition summarized in modern references
Imported cult restructures Roman religious politics; spectacle processions; backlash and reversal
Cybele’s “black stone”
Pessinus (Phrygia) → Rome
Explicit (“fallen from the sky”)
Large black stone
Livy reference via Pessinus overview
State-sponsored import; new priesthood; major festival cycle; political legitimation
Aphrodite Paphia’s stone
Paphos, Cyprus
Implicit/explicit in classical discussion (“reason obscure” but stone idol emphasized)
Rounded/conical
Classical tradition summarized in baetyl overview
Centuries of pilgrimage; cult continuity through changing empires
Nabataean betyls
Petra / wider Nabataea
Mixed; often “divine presence” via aniconic betyls
Rectangular slabs / niche-cut forms
Scholarly article on Petra betyls
Durable temple architecture; standardized niches; religious continuity under Rome
Scientific argument it’s likely agate, not meteorite
One of the world’s largest ongoing pilgrimage rites; enduring tactile ritual
This dataset is deliberately mixed: some are likely meteorites, some explicitly treated as such, some are not meteorites at all, and one is a living ritual case with competing material interpretations.
That mix is the point. The baetyl pattern does not require the object to be extraterrestrial rock. It requires the narrative role: “arrived from above, therefore it authorizes reality down here.”
Case study 1: Elagabal’s stone, described like a “sent” object
The most UAP-flavored baetyl account in Greco-Roman literature attaches to the Syrian sun cult of Elagabal (Elagabalus), centered at Emesa. When the teenage priest-emperor Elagabalus reached Rome, he imported the cult object itself: a black conical stone, treated as the god.
A Roman coin depicting EMICΩN KOΛΩN in the back, the hexastyle temple containing the conical stone of Elagabal. (CNG)
A key detail, repeated in later summaries of Herodian: the stone was “worshipped as though it were sent from heaven,” and viewers pointed to small projections and markings as evidence of a sun-sign.
Witness account profile (who is “the witness” here?)
Ancient history rarely gives us a named farmer saying “I saw it land.” Instead, we get elite observers documenting public rituals. In UAP terms, these are credentialed secondary witnesses reporting a widely visible state event: the emperor’s processions, the stone’s display, the insistence on heavenly provenance.
After-effects
Elagabal’s baetyl did not just sit on a shelf. It attempted a hostile takeover of Roman religious hierarchy: a foreign stone elevated above Jupiter by the state’s top political actor.
That’s one of the cleanest examples of a baetyl acting like a power object. The stone’s “arrival from heaven” becomes a lever for authority, and the spectacle becomes a public “upload” of the cult into Roman life.
UAP-relevant note: In modern close-encounter cases, witnesses often report that the most important effect is not the object’s shape but its ability to reorganize attention, belief, and behavior. Baetyl narratives show the same structure, except on a civilizational timescale.
Case study 2: Cybele’s black stone, imported like strategic technology
In 204 BCE, Rome brought the cult of Cybele (Magna Mater) from Greece to the city, removing her most important image: a large black stone said to have fallen from the sky.
The “fallen from heaven” tag matters because it converts an object into a mandate. A statue can be copied. A stone that “arrived” cannot. It is singular, legitimizing, and politically useful.
Religious group behaviors: the “operating system” around the stone
Cybele’s Roman cult developed distinctive priestly forms and festivals. Even when later authors disagreed on details, the state investment is unmistakable: ceremonies, buildings, calendrical integration, and a managed public narrative that this object changed Rome’s relationship to fate.
After-effects
A baetyl can be a foreign-body insertion into a society: new rituals, new specialists, new social friction. That is exactly what state-sponsored importation produces.
UAP-relevant note: Contemporary UAP politics often circles around the question “what would governments do if an anomalous object were real?” Ancient Rome gives us an answer pattern: they would institutionalize it.
Case study 3: Aphrodite Paphia’s stone, a pilgrimage engine
At Paphos, Aphrodite’s cult centered on a stone simulacrum, described in classical discussions as rounded or conical, with even Roman-era writers acknowledging the form while admitting the rationale was “obscure.”
The baetyl of Aphrodite at Palaepaphos, described by Tacitus. (Public Domain)
What matters for our dataset is not whether the stone was a meteorite (claims exist, but are not uniformly demonstrable). What matters is the stability of the pattern:
aniconic object
housed at a major sanctuary
attracts pilgrimage over centuries
persists through political regime change
After-effects
Pilgrimage is an economic and social force multiplier. A baetyl can function like a gravity well for human movement, gifts, vows, stories, and identity. In UAP terms: the object becomes a node where reality feels “thin,” and so people keep returning.
Case study 4: Nabataean baetyls, carved into the landscape
The Nabataeans took the baetyl idea and built it into architecture. In Petra and beyond, we find betyl niches and aniconic stone representations tied to deities such as Dushara. (Chicago Journals)
Rock cut Nabataean betyl located at Petra. (Anderson, Bjorn. University of Iowa – Private collection)
Here the “fallen from heaven” phrasing can be less explicit, but the interface logic is the same: the god is present as a stone-form, not a portrait. That absence of anthropomorphic imagery is often misunderstood as “primitive.” Data-first reading suggests something else: an intentional refusal to claim the divine has a human face.
After-effects
Nabataean betyls generate a measurable archaeological signature: repeated forms, repeated placement, repeated ritual affordances. This is exactly the kind of “pattern persistence” investigators look for in modern UAP flaps: repeated environmental staging that outlives any single witness.
Case study 5: The Kaaba Black Stone, where the pattern is alive but the geology is contested
The Black Stone (Arabic: الحجر الأسود, romanized: al-Ḥajar al-Aswad) is a rock set into the eastern corner of the Kaaba, the ancient building in the center of the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, is a living-world ritual focus, but its composition has been debated for a long time. A scientific argument in meteoritics literature contends it is probably agate, not meteorite. (Astrophysics Data System)
The Black Stone is seen through a portal in the Kaaba. (Saudi Press Agency – SPA)
For UAPedia, this is a feature, not a problem. The baetyl pattern is not “meteorites are UAP.” The pattern is:
a stone becomes a contact point between heaven and earth
a community builds a high-stability ritual around it
the object anchors identity and movement at massive scale
Even if the Kaaba stone is terrestrial agate, its role in the baetyl pattern is structurally perfect.
“Images” in a data-first ancient article: what to look at
Images should be treated like evidence categories: not proof of origin, but proof of representation (how cultures depicted the object).
Suggested image anchors (matching the carousel above):
Paphos stone photograph (modern museum photo often circulated) as a candidate aniconic cult object (representation evidence; provenance debated).
Coin depictions of the Emesa stone in a temple or on a chariot, showing how Romans visualized the baetyl’s “public interface.”
Petra betyl niche showing standardized architectural embedding of aniconic divinity. (Chicago Journals)
Shrine/betyl archaeology (Humayma example image) demonstrating the betyl as built form, not just legend.
Implications for UAP studies
Baetyls as “trans-medium residue,” culturally speaking
Modern UAP cases often feature “trace effects” or residuals that are small compared to the event: a scorch mark, a fragment, a landing imprint. Ancient baetyls can be read as culture-retained residues: the thing that remains when the sky event has passed and only the anchor object is left behind.
A warning to modern investigators: don’t confuse “object” with “phenomenon”
If a baetyl is a meteorite, that does not make the cult “explained.” The human response is still anomalously intense and organized around “arrival from above.” If a baetyl is not a meteorite, that also does not dissolve the pattern. It suggests the “heavenly object” category can attach to stones through routes other than literal skyfall, including legendary compression, political theater, or genuine anomalous events later stabilized into ritual.
The “control system” reading, without mysticism
From a systems perspective, baetyls function as high-persistence nodes that steer attention, movement, and authority. In modern terms, they are like persistent beacons that keep a population oriented around “the sky is not empty, and it touched us here.”
Claims taxonomy
Overall classification for “ancient baetyl pattern narratives”: Probable. Rationale: strong evidence that multiple cultures venerated aniconic stones explicitly described as sky-sent, with archaeological and textual anchors (Elagabalus, Pessinus, Petra). The leap from “sky-sent sacred object” to a specific non-human technological origin remains incomplete.
Case-level notes:
Emesa/Elagabal stone: Probable (textual convergence; material specifics uncertain). (Wikipedia)
Pessinus/Cybele stone: Probable (ancient textual anchor via Livy reference; exact material unknown). (Wikipedia)
Petra/Nabataean betyls: Verified as aniconic cult practice (archaeology + scholarship), but “fallen from heaven” origin is Disputed depending on the specific betyl. (Chicago Journals)
Kaaba Black Stone as meteorite: Disputed (meteoritics literature argues agate). (Astrophysics Data System)
Speculation labels
Hypothesis
Baetyl narratives preserve a degraded memory of rare luminous skyfall events (meteors, bolides, meteorite recoveries) that were later ritualized because they were emotionally overwhelming and socially useful.
Witness Interpretation
Ancient observers interpreted unusual stones, markings, and processions as proof of divine presence, and described them with “sent from heaven” language because that was the most precise vocabulary available to them. (Wikipedia)
Researcher Opinion
The most productive UAP-relevant move is not to argue “baetyls were spacecraft,” but to treat baetyls as a cross-cultural indicator that humans repeatedly encoded certain “sky-contact” experiences into durable objects, then built institutions around those objects. The durability of that behavior suggests the initiating experiences were compelling enough to outcompete normal forgetting.
References
Dietz, R. S. (1974). Kaaba Stone: Not a meteorite, probably an agate. Meteoritics, 9, 173. https://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1974Metic…9..173D?utm_source=https://uapedia.ai
Wenning, R. (2001). The Betyls of Petra. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, (324). https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.2307/1357633?utm_source=https://uapedia.ai
If there is a single object that crystallises the whole “reverse engineered UAP” narrative into one tangible machine, it is the Alien Reproduction Vehicle, usually shortened to ARV, and nicknamed the Fluxliner.
It is not just an idea. It comes with a full cutaway blueprint, dimensions, suggested materials, an internal crew cabin, capacitor stacks, Tesla coils and even ejection seats.
Yet no photograph of the craft has ever surfaced, and every public description ultimately flows from one illustrator and a friend who claims he saw it in a guarded hangar at Norton Air Force Base in California in 1988. (UFO History)
This article takes a data-first pass through that story: the witnesses, documents, technical claims, critics and the way the ARV has spread into modern UAP discourse. We treat it as a historical case file rather than a belief test.
The Norton Air Force Base Origin Story
The ARV narrative begins with a specific date and place:
Date 12 November 1988
Location Norton Air Force Base, San Bernardino, California, during an “air show” and classified industry exhibit. (UFO 420 – Alien & UFO News)
Brad Sorensen and the hangar with the curtain
According to long-time aerospace illustrator Mark McCandlish, his college acquaintance Brad Sorensen, an aerospace designer, attended the 1988 Norton event to mingle with contractors and clients. Sorensen allegedly became separated from his group, joined another, and was inadvertently swept into a restricted presentation led by a three-star general. (PodScripts)
In that hangar, the general gave a walkthrough of advanced classified aircraft. Eventually, a curtain was pulled back to reveal three disc-shaped craft that looked, as Sorensen allegedly put it, “like something from the 1950s.” (PodScripts)
Key data points from the Sorensen account, as relayed by McCandlish and later writers:
Three craft of different sizes, code-named “Baby Bear” (about 24 ft), “Mama Bear” (about 60 ft) and “Papa Bear” (around 120–130 ft diameter). (Spreaker)
All shared the same general shape: a classic saucer form with a thick lower “skirt” and a hemispherical crew dome on top.
A ring of large, greenish “capacitor plates” in the lower hull and a central column inside, with coils and components suggestive of high-voltage equipment. (Robert Francis Jr.)
“Synthetic vision” camera system instead of conventional windows, feeding displays inside the crew cabin. (ResearchGate)
The general allegedly stated that the craft used a kind of zero-point or “electrogravitic” propulsion and were capable of “light speed or better.” (Spreaker)
Sorensen himself has remained almost entirely silent in public. The story reaches the wider world through McCandlish interviews, Disclosure Project documents and secondary write-ups. That indirection is central to any assessment of the case.
From hangar story to blueprint
A few months after Sorensen’s account, McCandlish began drafting a detailed schematic of the craft, based on repeated conversations and sketches, combined with his own knowledge of aerospace hardware. The 1989 blueprint, now widely reproduced, shows: (Robert Francis Jr.)
A circular craft with a cutaway revealing internal decks.
A stack of three high-voltage capacitor “decks” in the lower skirt.
A central vacuum column described as a mercury vapor device.
A circumferential solenoid coil around the rim.
A flywheel, crew seats, access hatch and peripheral systems.
Fac-simile of the original publication referring to the Fluxliner – 1988 (Public Domain)
McCandlish copyrighted the drawing and circulated it within the UAP research community. Later, modelers, 3D artists and independent researchers further elaborated the design. (ResearchGate)
The ARV Enters The Disclosure Era
The Disclosure Project and antigravity testimony
In the late 1990s, Dr. Steven Greer began assembling military and intelligence witnesses for what would become the Disclosure Project. In an executive briefing document prepared around 2001, Greer cites “the testimony of Mark McCandlish” as evidence that human-made antigravity craft exist, using cameras in place of windows and operating in deep black programs. (Internet Archive)
McCandlish’s description of the ARV is presented alongside other witnesses who claim that:
U.S. programs have mastered exotic propulsion, sometimes explicitly linked to reverse-engineered non-human craft.
These vehicles can operate without conventional jet fuel and may use electrogravitics or vacuum energy.
Skeptical commentary quickly followed. Philip J. Klass, in his Skeptics UFO Newsletter (SUN #73, Fall 2002), highlighted Greer’s statements about “Alien Reproduction Vehicles” and argued that claims of a covert group staging fake UAP events with ARVs were unsupported.
Zero Point: the Story of Mark McCandlish and the Fluxliner
In 2013, filmmaker James Allen released the documentary “Zero Point: The Story of Mark McCandlish and the Flux Liner.” The film focuses on: (IMDb)
McCandlish’s career as an aerospace illustrator for major contractors.
His retelling of the Norton AFB episode and Sorensen’s role.
Animated and live-action visualisations of the fluxliner ARV.
Interviews with researchers interested in electrogravitics and zero-point energy.
The documentary, combined with online clips like “Blueprint for a UFO” and later YouTube explainers, pushed the ARV into a wider audience. (UFO History)
Gordon Novel, Robert Francis Jr and technical elaborations
Gordon Novel, a controversial figure with alleged intelligence connections, published “Supreme Cosmic Secret: How the U.S. Government Reverse-Engineered An Extraterrestrial Spacecraft!” in 2010, which featured an ARV-like craft on the cover and incorporated some of the same design motifs. (Robert Francis Jr.)
More recently, independent researcher Robert Francis Jr published an extensive breakdown of ARV components, treating the blueprint almost as an engineering requirements document. His article analyses: (Robert Francis Jr.)
The parallel-plate capacitor array, interpreted as a Biefeld–Brown electrogravitic device.
The circumferential electromagnetic coil, possibly using exotic conductor geometry.
Hypothetical inertial mass reduction mechanisms tied to zero-point vacuum fluctuations.
Francis openly labels much of his work as hypothesis and citizen-science, but it shows how the ARV has become a living technical meme, not just a drawing.
Anatomy Of The Fluxliner
From a data perspective, the ARV is best understood as a specific machine concept, not a generic “secret saucer.” Its features can be compared against known physics and propulsion ideas.
Basic configuration
Across McCandlish’s schematic, Novel’s artwork and derivative diagrams, the ARV has a consistent architecture: (Robert Francis Jr.)
The disc hull is about 60 ft diameter in the primary “Mama Bear” version.
Lower capacitor stack
Several concentric rings of triangular capacitor segments.
Alternating metal plates and green dielectric layers.
Central column
Often described as containing mercury vapor or plasma.
Associated Tesla-like coils and possibly Marx-generator style pulsed supplies.
Rim coil
Thick, heavily insulated solenoid running around the circumference.
Hypothesised to generate strong, pulsed magnetic fields.
Crew sphere
Spherical compartment near the top with seats and control consoles.
Surrounded by shielding materials, possibly with unusual nuclear spin properties. (Robert Francis Jr.)
According to McCandlish’s retellings, the general at Norton described the craft as operating on “zero-point energy” and capable of extreme accelerations that would normally kill human occupants without some form of inertial mitigation. (Spreaker)
Rendering of what three Fluxliners (ARVs) being showcased to an audience might look like. (UAPedia)
Electrogravitics and the Biefeld–Brown effect
The ARV’s capacitor skirt strongly echoes the work of T. Townsend Brown, who in the 1920s–60s claimed that asymmetrical high-voltage capacitors could generate thrust through a coupling between electricity and gravity, a field he called electrogravitics. Modern mainstream analyses of the Biefeld–Brown effect, including NASA and independent academic studies, find that:
Asymmetrical high-voltage capacitors do produce thrust in air.
The force is explained by ion wind or ion drift in the surrounding medium, not true antigravity.
Experiments in high vacuum have not found significant anomalous thrust beyond conventional electrohydrodynamics. (TU Dresden)
ARV proponents argue that Brown’s work was only a starting point and that the capacitor array in the fluxliner operates at much higher voltages and in regimes where coupling to the quantum vacuum might occur, rather than simple ion wind. This belongs firmly in the “hypothesis” category rather than established physics. (Robert Francis Jr.)
Zero-point energy and inertia control
In the ARV literature, the capacitor array and rim coil are often linked to attempts to harness vacuum fluctuations or zero-point energy (ZPE). Mainstream physics recognises ZPE as part of quantum field theory, yet is strongly skeptical that it can be used as a practical energy source or propellant.
Inertial mass arises from interactions between matter and vacuum fluctuations.
Carefully structured EM fields could reduce effective inertia by redirecting or modulating those interactions.
The ARV coil and capacitor geometry might be designed to create such a “mass reduction bubble,” allowing rapid acceleration without crushing the crew.
This is an intriguing line of thought but remains speculative and unverified in peer-reviewed experimental work. Even sympathetic academic treatments of exotic propulsion emphasise that repeatable lab confirmation is lacking. (APEC)
Who Is Connected To The ARV Story
Mark McCandlish
Profession: Aerospace and technical illustrator for major contractors such as Lockheed and Rockwell. (The UFO Spotlight On…)
Role: Primary public source and visualiser of the ARV concept.
Evidence:
He never claimed to have seen the craft himself.
His knowledge is second-hand, transmitted from Sorensen and reinforced by later conversations with other insiders and researchers. (Spreaker)
He drew and copyrighted the widely circulated blueprint. (Robert Francis Jr.)
McCandlish became a Disclosure Project witness, and his fluxliner story has been repeated in radio interviews, the “Zero Point” documentary and numerous podcasts until his death in 2021. (cdn.preterhuman.net)
“Brad Sorensen”
Sorensen, as described by McCandlish, is the original Norton AFB witness:
Background: Aerospace designer who gained clients in classified aerospace work. (The UFO Spotlight On…)
Claim: Accidentally attended the Norton hangar presentation, saw the three ARVs demonstrated and later described them in detail to McCandlish. (PodScripts)
In late 2024, journalist Michael Shellenberger submitted written testimony to the U.S. House Oversight Committee that referenced Sorensen’s story explicitly, describing a “Fluxliner, aka an Alien Reproduction Vehicle (ARV)” displayed at Norton and noting that Brad had given all the details to McCandlish. (House Docs)
As of now, there is no widely accessible, long-form on-camera interview with Sorensen equivalent to McCandlish’s many appearances. This gap is one of the key weaknesses in the evidentiary chain.
Steven Greer and the Disclosure movement
Greer popularised the broader ARV idea, often using the term for any advanced man-made craft allegedly derived from non-human technology. In SUN #73, Klass quotes Greer describing a covert multinational group that has “mastered the technologies” and can deploy Alien Reproduction Vehicles to simulate hostile non-human attacks, a claim Klass sharply criticises.
Regardless of one’s view of Greer, his amplification of the ARV story helped move it from a narrow UAP-research subculture into a wider disclosure narrative.
Other researchers and cultural spread
Richard Dolan lists McCandlish among important modern whistleblower-type witnesses and treats the ARV case as suggestive but not proven.
Darcy Weir’s TR-3B documentaries sometimes frame the triangular TR-3B craft as a later generation ARV, implying a lineage of black-project vehicles built from reverse-engineered UAP technology. (Google Play)
The Why Files, YouTube explainer channels and podcasts like “The US Military’s Secret Flying Saucer Project” introduce the ARV to a broader online audience with simplified retellings of the Norton story. (PodScripts)
The result is that, by the mid 2020s, the fluxliner had become a kind of canonical saucer in alternative aerospace lore, with 3D models, fan art and even desk-sized “ARV” models sold online. (Aquila)
Critics, Counter-Evidence And The AARO Report
Internal skepticism
Even within UAP-interested communities, several consistent criticisms appear:
The idea that someone could simply “wander into” a presentation of the most advanced secret craft by attaching to the wrong tour group is seen as operationally implausible. (Reddit)
No independent photos, videos or physical documents that conclusively show the craft have emerged, despite the event allegedly occurring in front of multiple VIPs and industry representatives.
The ARV blueprint combines recognisable off-the-shelf concepts (capacitors, Tesla coils, solenoids) in a way that may be more aesthetically compelling than physically justified.
Philip Klass’s SUN article mocked Greer’s reliance on ARV claims as evidence for a staged alien attack narrative and pointed out that, if antigravity vehicles existed for decades, it is difficult to explain why expensive jet aircraft and aerial refuelling remain dominant in visible military operations.
AARO and official reverse-engineering denial
In March 2024, the Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) released its Historical Record Report, Volume 1, which surveyed U.S. government UAP programs from 1945 onward. The report concluded: (U.S. Department of War)
AARO found no empirical evidence that the U.S. government or private industry has ever successfully reverse-engineered extraterrestrial technology.
Alleged reverse-engineering programs and named companies were investigated, and no off-world materials or unreported black programs were confirmed.
Claims of secret reverse-engineering efforts are assessed as largely the result of circular reporting within a small community of individuals who reinforce each other’s narratives.
Mainstream media headlines summarised this as “no evidence of alien tech or hidden UAP craft,” which implicitly pushes ARV-type claims into the “unsubstantiated” category. (The Guardian)
From a UAPedia perspective, and in line with our editorial policy on government sources, that report is an important data point but not a final verdict. A review authored inside a security apparatus will naturally be constrained by classification boundaries, political incentives and the scope of what investigators are allowed to see. At minimum, however, AARO’s statements mean that anyone asserting the ARV exists must now explain why neither AARO nor Congress could find confirming documentation.
Physics-based skepticism
Physicists and propulsion engineers who have examined electrogravitics and zero-point propulsion consistently stress:
Biefeld–Brown devices appear to be electrohydrodynamic thrusters, not gravity manipulators, when examined under controlled conditions. (Wikipedia)
The zero-point field is real, but there is no experimentally validated way to tap it as a net energy source or reactionless propellant, and most “free energy” style devices fail under rigorous testing. (Wikipedia)
This does not prove the ARV cannot exist, but it places a heavy burden of proof on claims that its capacitor stack and coil can do something qualitatively beyond known physics.
Applications And Strategic Implications (If ARVs Are Real)
Even critics usually concede that, if a craft like the fluxliner actually exists and performs as described, the implications are profound.
Military and aerospace applications
Hypothesised performance attributes:
Vertical takeoff and landing with silent or near-silent operation.
Extreme acceleration, possibly without sonic booms due to local manipulation of air density or plasma sheaths. (Robert Francis Jr.)
Long-duration flight or space travel without conventional fuel, if some form of vacuum energy or advanced power source is used. (Robert Francis Jr.)
Such a vehicle would:
Render most existing air and space fleets obsolete.
Collapse the cost of moving mass around Earth orbit and beyond.
Provide unprecedented strategic mobility and reconnaissance capability.
The absence of overt, undeniable uses of such capabilities in open warfare or space operations is often cited as a major argument against ARVs being fully operational in large numbers.
Civilisational implications
For the broader UAP discourse, the ARV occupies a liminal zone:
On one hand, it is offered as proof that UAP-like performance can be achieved by human technology, which would explain at least some disc sightings as secret terrestrial craft.
On the other hand, ARV advocates nearly always trace the origin of that technology to crashed non-human craft and reverse-engineering programs, which in turn presuppose a long history of non-human presence.
AARO’s report explicitly addresses this narrative and finds no evidence for successful reverse-engineering or hidden extraterrestrial technology, although researchers like Marik von Rennenkampff have criticised that report for selective framing, indicating continued debate. (New Paradigm Institute)
Claims Taxonomy
Given the available data, UAPedia classifies the core ARV propositions as follows. These are provisional and may change as new evidence appears.
Core claims
Claim A In November 1988, three disc-shaped craft known as Alien Reproduction Vehicles were displayed inside a restricted hangar at Norton Air Force Base and demonstrated for VIPs.
Evidence: Second-hand testimony via Mark McCandlish, attributed to Brad Sorensen, plus layered secondary accounts and derivative media. (House Docs)
Contradictions: No independent photographic record; no other named witnesses publicly confirming the demonstration at a similar level of detail; AARO’s 2024 review finding no supporting program documentation. (U.S. Department of War)
Claims taxonomy: Disputed
Claim B The ARVs use a combination of high-voltage capacitors, Tesla-type coils and rim solenoids to generate a genuine gravitational or inertial mass-reduction field, not just ion wind.
Evidence: Conceptual arguments, some fringe experiments on Biefeld–Brown dynamics, speculative zero-point models and the detailed ARV blueprint. (Robert Francis Jr.)
Contradictions: Mainstream experimental work explains observed thrust as electrohydrodynamics; no peer-reviewed replication of strong anomalous gravity-like forces. (Wikipedia)
Claims taxonomy: Probable from the perspective of advocates, but given current public data UAPedia classifies this as Disputed.
Claim C The United States and possibly other nations have operational fleets of ARVs capable of interstellar travel.
Evidence: Assertions in disclosure-movement literature, some testimony referencing long-range missions, consistent reuse of ARV imagery in “secret space program” narratives. (UFO 420 – Alien & UFO News)
Contradictions: Lack of clear, open demonstrations of such capabilities; AARO’s explicit finding of no evidence for reverse-engineered extraterrestrial technology or hidden fleets of off-world craft. (U.S. Department of War)
Claims taxonomy: Legend
Speculation labels
To make the evidentiary boundaries explicit:
Hypothesis
That inertial mass can be significantly reduced by structuring EM fields to manipulate vacuum fluctuations, as posited in some ARV analyses. (Robert Francis Jr.)
That zero-point energy can be practically harvested as a high-density power source for such craft. (Wikipedia)
Witness Interpretation
Sorensen’s interpretation of what the general said and what the displays in the hangar meant. Even if his recollection is accurate, he may have been interpreting a classified but terrestrial HV-propulsion testbed rather than a fully interstellar vehicle.
McCandlish’s technical extrapolations when turning verbal descriptions into a cutaway blueprint.
Researcher Opinion
The expanded technical treatments by Francis, Novel and others, which attempt to connect the ARV to broader theoretical frameworks of electrogravitics and vacuum engineering. (Robert Francis Jr.)
How UAPedia Treats The ARV Case
Consistent with UAPedia’s editorial stance, we:
Do not dismiss ARV claims simply because they conflict with current official reports. AARO and similar bodies are important sources, but not exclusive arbiters of truth. (New Paradigm Institute)
Give weight to detailed testimony, especially when a witness has relevant professional background. In this case, however, the strongest testimony is second-hand, which reduces its legal-style probative power.
Distinguish carefully between evidential statements (what was seen, who said what, which documents exist) and speculative architectures built upon them.
At present, the ARV sits at an interesting crossroads: there is enough detail that engineers can debate its feasibility, build models and propose experiments, yet not enough corroboration to move it out of the disputed category.
If future whistleblowers or declassifications reveal technical drawings, program budgets, or test reports that match the fluxliner blueprint independent of McCandlish, that categorisation may change quickly.
Alien Reproduction Vehicle, ARV, fluxliner, Mark McCandlish, Norton Air Force Base 1988, electrogravitics, Biefeld–Brown effect, zero point energy propulsion, secret space program, UAP reverse engineering, antigravity craft, black budget programs, Steven Greer Disclosure Project, TR-3B, advanced aerospace vehicle
In this episode of New Realities, host Alan Steinfeld interviews Bill Homann, the caretaker of the world-famous Mitchell-Hedges Crystal Skull. Homann shares the fascinating history of the skull, from its discovery in Lubaantun (Belize) by Anna Mitchell-Hedges to its mysterious anatomical precision that defies explanation by traditional lapidary techniques. The conversation explores the skull’s connection to Mayan legends, the significance of the 2012 calendar cycle, and reports of metaphysical phenomena such as holographic images and energy fields. Homann also discusses his global travels with the skull and the potential shift in human consciousness.
Alan Steinfeld: Okay, it is New Realities with Alan Steinfeld, and that was a song called “The Song of the Soul” by Chris Williamson. Tonight, I have a program that I’ve been wanting to do for a long time because it’s about the crystal skull, the Mitchell-Hedges crystal skull. I am talking to the current owner of that skull, Bill Homann, and he will be coming to New York City April 4th, sponsored by the ARE Center of New York, and will be at the Community Church on, at 30, at 40 East 35th Street. If you want more information, uh, you can email me at newrealities@earthlink.net – .net. Bill, are you there?
Bill Homann: Uh, yes I am.
Alan Steinfeld: Okay, so let’s get into the story. Last I heard, um, well, this, this… well, the whole thing about the crystal skull is, um, supposedly from what I know, they were made by an, some kind of ancient, probably alien technology. Uh, describe how you think… well, describe what this looks like and how you think it was made.
Bill Homann: Okay, well, I’ll tell you, the Mitchell-Hedges skull is a very special, special thing because it is a, uh, anatomically correct skull, life-size. They did a, uh, forensic study on it, uh, back in the 90s and determined that it was a Mesoamerican female of ancient origin between 25 and 29 is what they determined. Uh, it, uh, it’s pretty amazing. It’s just, it’s something you have to see to really, uh, get the full value of it. But how it was made, uh, it’s pretty, it’s amazing how to say who made it or when they made it. It’s… there’s a lot of, uh, uh, beliefs by the ancient people or the different, uh, uh, groups of Maya or different people that have ideas.
Alan Steinfeld: Wait, wait, let me just back up. Bill, one second, I just want to get something straight. When you described it as a skull that’s… you mean a similar human skull would, would be as if it was someone who was 29 years old from a Mesoamerican background? Is that what you’re saying? Because this is made of all crystal. And so if they were to take that and make it and have it as bone, they’d kind of trace it back to what you just described.
Bill Homann: Uh, that’s correct.
Alan Steinfeld: That’s amazing they can actually do that. Go ahead.
Bill Homann: Yeah, what… yeah, that’s the amazing part is, is that it is anatomically correct. And it is in two pieces. The, the top half of the skull and the jaw is separate. And that, what is kind of amazing because that’s another, uh, reason that it’s, it should not even be here because, uh, crystal being very hard and then trying to carve, uh, the jaw separate is just like, how did they do it? And uh, so that technology—
Alan Steinfeld: Well, because it wasn’t done by machines. There was no technology and, and of course they can’t trace how old it is because it’s crystal, there’s no way to carbon date it, right?
Bill Homann: Uh, that’s correct. Yeah. Uh, yeah, just go by the different feelings and legend. You go… the, the Mayans believe that the, the skulls were brought here, uh, from a continent that had sunk and brought by the people from that continent to, to their, uh, continent after, at the end of the third, uh, world as they call it, in the beginning of the fourth world.
Alan Steinfeld: So you’re saying this is Atlan—or this… the Mayans say we, we might call it Atlantean or Lemurian? Is that what they’re saying the crystal skull is?
Bill Homann: Uh, yeah, I would… I’ve been working with, uh, the Mayans in the area of Lubaantun. They’re a very special group of Mayans and they, uh, going by the beliefs from the high priests and different things, that’s pretty much what they have told me is that they believe that where it’s came from. Because it was found by F.A. Mitchell-Hedges and his daughter Anna in 1924. They found it in a pyramid in a site in, uh, in a place called, uh, Lubaantun, which is in now Belize, which was in British Honduras. And uh, it was buried in the pyramid for over a thousand years when they opened it up in 1924. So how it got there or who put it there, there’s a lot of, uh, different speculation. So it makes it pretty, pretty interesting.
Alan Steinfeld: Oh, can you back up one second also and tell us how you came into possession of this, uh, you know, priceless artifact, really?
Bill Homann: Uh, well, what it is is, uh, I would always had a, a deep interest in adventure and that has always been kind of a, a center point of my life. And, uh, I heard about the crystal skull way back in the, in the late 60s and, uh, through an article. And, uh, I, I was kind of mesmerized by it and I thought it was just… I just felt there was something special about it. And I was hoping someday to be able to see it. And back in, in, in the, in the late 70s, I heard about the crystal skull being in Canada and, uh, contacted, uh, Anna Mitchell-Hedges, who had… who was, uh, the current owner of the skull, and she invited me up to see it. And we became good friends and over the years, I was able to take her on different… when she went on lectures and different things, I was able to help her. And we got to be good friends and I was able to be taught by her, uh, what to do with it, how to take care of it. And, uh, she… in her last part of her life, uh, she lived to be a hundred years old, she spent the last eight years with me in Indiana where I was living at the time and, uh, she, you know, completed the education of what she expected with the skull, what she wanted done with it, and how, how it’s, uh, how the secrets, the different secrets of the skull that she was taught by the Mayan people. So, uh, giving me, uh… she passed away in, on my birthday in 2007, uh, and passed it on to me to carry on her tradition, what she wanted done with it was bringing it out so people can see it, experience it. Not everyone, but the people that are drawn to it. It’s a pretty amazing thing because people are drawn to it from all over the world and I try to make that available that if they do want to see it—and that’s why I feel New York is a good place that, that, uh, you know, I love to be out there and make it available for the people that find it interesting that would like to experience the energy and, uh, the crystal skull.
Alan Steinfeld: Oh yeah, I’m very excited by it because of… I, I know there’s magic in there because, you know, one of what I… I heard an old interview with, um, with what was it? Mitchell-Hedges, uh, the daughter, what was her first name? Margaret?
Bill Homann: Anna.
Alan Steinfeld: Anna Mitchell-Hedges. And she talked about, uh, well, really the ability of, of visionaries to look into this skull and start to see pictures. And then I, I saw actually a photograph of the skull and I started to actually see pictures just in the photograph of the skull. Different shapes sort of coming to life as if like what crystal ball gazers do. I started to see that. Is that one of the magic, um, elements of the skull that you’re aware of?
Bill Homann: Yeah, there is… there’s a several things that, uh, skulls have different abilities put in them. And this one definitely, uh, it’s always neat when you take a picture because you never know what you might get. When I was on, uh, back in Australia a few months ago, uh, someone took a picture and they showed it to me and it, it had a whole like a city in it and you had people along the side of the road and people sitting down and all kind of things like that and, and it just appeared in the, in the skull. So, uh, and other times you might take a picture and it might be like an outer space picture. There’s pictures of the skull that you could probably line up to different constellations and stuff and, uh, probably ones that, you know, you’d have to really study to try to find out which ones they were, but there’s things that just appear in the skull and, uh, that’s, that’s pretty, uh, pretty neat. Especially when you take a picture, you, uh, you are… you can be really surprised with what might come out of it.
Alan Steinfeld: I know, and does it… you think those pictures are based on the consciousness of the person looking at it or the consciousness of the photo or something that the skull is actually trying to communicate with us at this time?
Bill Homann: I think it’s… there’s a communication there to what the person needs. It seems like what it does is it mirrors the person’s inner, uh, self and you don’t always really… like, you might say that, “Oh, I wish I could do this or I wish I could do that,” but that’s just on the outside, but your real inner self might have a need for something else. And the skull kind of goes into the inner self and mirrors that inner self and brings that out. And, uh, so I, I think it’s that more that type of a, a picture.
Alan Steinfeld: So what other magic proper—I would call them magic—but what else did, um, uh, Anna Mitchell-Hedges tell you about the skull, um, in this, um, new course of bringing it public?
Bill Homann: Okay, well, uh, what it is—and a lot of it has to do with the time we’re living right now. We’re living in a very special, special time and it’s a, a time of, uh, of great change and everything, but there’s a lot of possibility for really good things. And, uh, the, uh, the Mayans believe, uh, they have a, their calendar. There’s a number of different races and, uh, of people that have the same belief that the, uh, that the Mayan calendar and the time of it is very important. And, uh, 2012 is a time that’s becoming more and more in people’s minds. And the crystal skull is very much with the Mayan tradition, a part of that, uh, prophecy and what’s going to happen. And, you know, a lot of people feel doom and gloom, the end of the world or whatever, but really the Mayans believe that it’s the end of a cycle, a 26,000-year cycle, and they see it as a tree. They see it as a tree and for the last 26,000 years, we’ve been in the roots of the tree and now in, in 2012, we’re going to go from the roots into the trunk. So I see it as going from being in the, in the dark into the light. So that being the case, it sounds pretty good to me. So I’m ready… I’m ready for something good.
Alan Steinfeld: But how did the skull actually communi– I mean, it’s just, you know, crystal. How did it actually communicate something about 2012? What was the mechanism of that exchange?
Bill Homann: Okay. Uh, what it is is different, uh, people that created it and they must, they must have a, a knowledge, uh, greater than, than us. It’s made out of piezoelectric quartz crystal, the same kind of crystal that you use for computers. And so there’s a possibility of, of storing knowledge in it at a rate or a type that we don’t really understand. But according to what they believe, there’s some type of knowledge stored in it that could be brought out and uh will be brought out in the, in, you know, as the time becomes closer.
Alan Steinfeld: But… okay, but let’s, um–
Bill Homann: I feel–
Alan Steinfeld: So I mean, who’s bringing out? I mean, how is it being brought out of the skull? And what’s… I mean, who’s interpreting the messages?
Bill Homann: Okay. Uh, it’s not just a, a one-way thing. There’s a lot of different things that are happening and, uh, you know, if you would, uh, kind of follow my, my path over the last, uh, year and a half or whatever, it’s kind of an amazing journey because it’s a nonstop type of action of evolution that I’ve been on. Uh, you know, I could tell you, you know, uh, my, you know, how it’s been happening. It’s just, uh, it’s pretty much like, uh, uh, it’s like you have to see it to believe it. It’s pretty wild.
Alan Steinfeld: Well describe some of it. Go ahead. Tell us about it cause it’s, it’s fascinating.
Bill Homann: Okay, well… okay, like in uh, just my schedule is I went from, uh, in September I did a, a lecture and then in September I was in Sedona. Then right after that, two days later, I went to Australia. I was in Australia going around working with Aborigines, working with some of the Aborigines at some of these energy—they call them sun lines. We call them energy lines in the earth and they… there was some that were blocked and the skull works really good with energy and it works on these sun lines or energy lines to balance it out and open them up. So with the help of the Aborigine elders, they… we were able to open up energy lines that connect a place called, uh, Mount Warning all the way through to Mount Man… Mount Machu Picchu in Peru. It was all… it was the one that was blocked and we were able to open that up and uh, it was… so they were all excited about that. So we did that in, uh, in October and then I… at the end of October, I went to, uh, Argen–tina and I was down there. Then I went to Brazil and I worked with a, a healer by the name of John of God which–
Alan Steinfeld: Oh, you worked with John of God on the cell… on the skull? With the skull?
Bill Homann: I worked… well, kind of an interesting story. I was uh down with… down there with, uh, with some friends and we were working on some energy stuff down there and I was in line, I had the skull in a bag cause I couldn’t just leave it. I had to have it with me. And I was… and I put it down to be in line and he looked at me and he said, “I want to see it right now.” I said, “What?” And he pointed at the bag. I said… and I said about three times and he, he just, he was really adamant. So I brought it up to him, opened it up and he grabbed it and took it out and held it and he said, “Where did you get it? Where are the other ones?” And then he said, uh, that uh, it came from a, a place that had sunk under the sea. And uh…
Alan Steinfeld: Wow.
Bill Homann: And then it started… he said several things like that, but I have tremendous respect for John and uh I’ve… John of God and I really want to uh, you know, with the skull and with whatever I have be able to work with him and his energies cause I think it’s an important thing for where we’re at in the planet right now.
Alan Steinfeld: But okay, but let’s um–
Bill Homann: No, but before you get onto that. Yeah, go ahead.
Alan Steinfeld: Yeah.
Bill Homann: And then after that it went… I went to, uh, Scotland and then worked around… did worked on energies in Edinburgh and then went and then went to uh Rosslyn Chapel with the skull and then came back and then went to Brazil or Belize and worked down in Belize with a Mayan high priest and then came back and then went to Arizona, did uh some work with some Monroe In… Institute people on uh remote viewing then uh went to uh… uh heck what was it after that? I mean, it’s just like one thing after another and it–
Alan Steinfeld: So you’re sort of tracking… you’re creating like a, a power grid or something. You’re gridding the planet with uh the skull.
Bill Homann: Well what’s happening is it’s moving me to these different places that I’m like I’m being drawn to like I was down in the area of Bermuda Triangle in, uh, January and that was a… there was something good to do down there. And it’s… I don’t know how that works, but I’m just… and I feel that New York City’s kind of an important place with all the things that are happening that, uh, to bring the skull. So for some reason, I’m, I’m going to be out there to try to do what I have to do and you know, I don’t even really understand it.
Alan Steinfeld: Well, uh, let’s definitely do a television show while you’re… when you’re here because I, I do mostly television, but I do this radio program too because it’s just another way to reach people, but um, I’m really excited about seeing it. Let’s talk about these other skulls. Uh, you know, that Sp– you know, Spielberg made that movie recently about the crystal skull and they’re supposedly bringing these 12 skulls like… like you have together will create some sort of uh energetic field around the earth. Is that true?
Bill Homann: Well, I, I don’t really have all the answers. All I do is I go by a lot of what the, the ancients uh have to say and how they’re… what their beliefs are. But they believe that there are uh a total of 13 skulls and really what I feel that they don’t have to be all found and brought to a certain place. I think they were put at the proper place and all we have to do is find the ones that have been found and move them back to where they were originally found. And I think by that will align the energy right in to where we have to do it. But that’s what I’m just kind of has come to me now and I’m not, uh, you know, hopefully by 2012 I’ll have it all figured out, but I’m working on it so.
Alan Steinfeld: Wait, have you met Max? The crystal skull called Max?
Bill Homann: Uh see, I’ve… I uh know about Max but I’ve never met uh Max, no.
Alan Steinfeld: It’d be interesting to put those two skulls together, see if there was some kind of electrical frequency that happened or, or something.
Bill Homann: Yeah. I think they… they’ve been together uh back in the either the 80s or 90s, but that was the last time. So uh, no I have… you know, Max is a is a very special skull and I have respect for it. There’s a lot of other ones that are… and each one seems to have a certain uh program in it that it does certain things. So they’re not all the same. So that’s kind of interesting.
Alan Steinfeld: So what does yours do? The Mitchell-Hedges skull?
Bill Homann: Uh, well, what it does is it works on the heart of man and it opens the heart to like a universal love. A universal love that all things are created, not just uh mankind, but animal life, plant life, uh, you know, the earth itself and all are connected and it works on bringing out that connection, opening people up to the fact that, hey, we… it’s a time for change. It’s a time to work in that more positive consciousness. So the, the skull is very important in that. So one thing, when you meet the skull or come to see it, you feel it very uh strongly, usually right in your heart chakra. That’s what’s vibrating the most. And it also works on a special place in the, in the human brain that’s kind of a dormant spot and it makes that vibrate and once you meet it and see it, it has that effect that uh you’re never… uh you kind of open up to, you know, it changes your life in a really neat way.
Alan Steinfeld: Wow, that’s fantastic. It, it probably has what they call a mirror neuron effect or something where it stimulates a kind of mechanism by… by just the kind of resonance that our skull has with that skull.
Bill Homann: A frequency. I think it, yeah, I think it’s a special frequency, yeah, that has that. And uh, so it’s, it’s pretty, pretty amazing. Uh I usually, you know, I like the people to, to get the energy and feel the energy because it, it kind of they take it with them and it, and it helps them. It’s a, it’s a healing thing. So I like to be able to do that for people.
Alan Steinfeld: So if this came from some ancient civilization, maybe Atlantis, how old would you say this skull is from what you can guess?
Bill Homann: Yeah. Well, I can, you know, I can only go by what they say and they say… they give me a uh they say 17,000 years old. Uh you know, it could be… there’s with the skull, if you, if you read about it, there’s all different people and they have all different theories. Uh, but I usually go by uh uh like what people like John of God and other of the, of the different uh masters that have that ability to uh kind of feel… like I worked with uh Grandfather Martin who was the prophet for the Hopi Nation and another person that I have great love and respect for and uh, and it was his feeling too and that’s, that’s the kind of uh thing I go with.
Alan Steinfeld: Have you ever had any um museums or people try to buy it or authorities try to get it from you? Have you had any things come up like that?
Bill Homann: Uh let’s see. Well, uh the skull has all kind of protections. It protects itself quite well. Uh and it’s has a purpose of what it’s doing. And then uh and I’m just more or less it’s like I’m the, the dummy that walks around and is and uh doing what it’s supposed to do, but I uh I do the, you know, I, I believe in what it’s, it’s doing for the planet and helping the world and I think the world is at a point that we can’t uh not be serious about uh moving ahead and trying to work in higher consciousness and and realizing that we’re all connected and if we we can do that, uh then there’s a chance for mankind to move to a really beautiful future. That’s what I feel.
Alan Steinfeld: I, I, that, that feels right too. But uh, do you think there’s some kind of intelligence emanating from the cell… the skull or is there uh an intelligence sort of um directing the skull from another dimension?
Bill Homann: Uh, I think it’s… that would be a hard one to, to say, but I think the skull has is an entity or there must be some kind of entities living inside it or whatever is what I, I can I feel being around it. I feel… you know, I don’t feel it–
Alan Steinfeld: You feel a presence in the… when you’re with… I mean, I guess you’re always with it so you’re always in touch with a presence, huh?
Bill Homann: There’s a presence there. Yeah, you feel the presence, right.
Alan Steinfeld: And is the presence psychically communicating with you or just showing you pictures. I guess with John of God and other people, it’s, it’s a sort of psychic communication, right?
Bill Homann: It communicates uh with yeah, well, I’ll tell you kind of an interesting thing when I was in uh… well, several places, but when I was in uh uh Australia, I worked with uh this doctor that developed what they called a PIP camera. And the PIP camera has the ability to uh see… what it does is it uh it uh times uh the timing of protons bouncing off of a different object, you know, could be skin, could be whatever. And it is able to uh by uh frequency would change the color so you can see energy. And it uh it’s pretty amazing we we played with it. I was able to like uh I do martial arts, so I was… I know how pressure energy runs through the body so I was able to touch a pressure point and see with the machine the energy stopping and backing up and then hit another pressure point and seeing the energy move. So it was pretty interesting. Now we used the skull, we had the skull sitting on a… in a coffee table and he was looking at it with the PIP machine. And you could see the skull and there was another skull that formed underneath it like an etheric skull.
Alan Steinfeld: Wow.
Bill Homann: And then they moved over. I uh sat down and I put my hands on it and then the skull the one underneath kind of went into the one uh above so there was just the one skull and then it was like white light and then my body started filling up with this white light and pretty soon the whole thing more or less uh like almost like it seemed like exploded and there was like a cone coming out the top of my head with like a rainbow of colors shooting out and he’s got that on uh he’s got it on his video so he was… he was seeing things that he didn’t believe that was even possible. We took the skull over to the PIP camera and showed the, the you know the screen to the skull and you could see the uh… well the skull, the third eye started spinning and it… the uh the PIP camera the system, the computer itself got kicked out of the system, which it never happened before and it just and uh he was like, but you could see the third eye the skull recognizing itself in the thing, which was kind of wild. So yeah, I don’t understand it. I just kind of go with it, but it’s a pretty amazing thing.
Alan Steinfeld: That’s fantastic. It’s amazing. I really… I’m… you’re getting me very excited about being in the presence of this thing, this uh being. I guess it’s more like a being than, than a, than a thing.
Bill Homann: I’m going to bring some of the, the PIP uh footage with me and I think you might find that very interesting. We were like doing a meditation uh at the uh at one of the uh uh cities I was going through and I was up there with the skull and he had the PIP camera and there was like energy coming out and you could see the energy circulating through everybody in the whole audience and it was so… it’s pretty amazing how that worked and he has that on, on film too so.
Alan Steinfeld: So you have a tape of… you have a videotape of that? You’re saying PIP, P-I-T camera? How do you say?
Bill Homann: Uh P-I-P. P-I-PIP. It’s uh proton, it’s like a photon camera is what it is. And it’s uh oh heck my uh doctor uh–
Alan Steinfeld: That’s okay.
Bill Homann: I’ll probably think of the name in a minute.
Alan Steinfeld: But no, you if you have…
Bill Homann: Yeah.
Alan Steinfeld: You have video footage of that, let’s when we do our television interview, let’s show some of that uh video footage uh if, if you don’t mind. And um–
Bill Homann: Right.
Alan Steinfeld: I think…
Bill Homann: Oh it’s yeah. It’s Dr. Harry Old… Oldfield is the one that uh he developed. He’s the scientist that developed the camera. So you might want to look at something about that. It’s pretty interesting. He’ll… if you look at it, he has a lot of pictures of the skull and some of the strange stuff he got. So.
Alan Steinfeld: Uh. So what do you see? I mean, yeah, this is a time for planetary change and for humanity to evolve and open the hearts and this skull is here as, as a kind of um caretaker of our evolution or a way of to help us evolve through its consciousness?
Bill Homann: Well the Mayans believe that the skulls come to out at a time of great change and need in the world. And that’s uh possibility why it’s here. We’re at a a major point that we’re at right now where a chance of a great possibilities for mankind. Uh a chance of really moving ahead uh like a quantum leap in to a higher uh consciousness. And I think the possibility that the skull could be uh something, you know, if the Mayan prophecy is right, something to do with that. So the skulls are very important in that.
Alan Steinfeld: Now, how is the skull connected to extraterrestrial civilizations, ET contacts? Because I, I think I saw like a spaceship in the Mitchell-Hedges skull once or a photograph of that. Um is there any connection?
Bill Homann: Like there is a… they usually when they take a picture underneath they can usually see a either one or a several different flying saucers the way the picture shows up. So there… there’s certain pictures that show up in certain parts. But uh how that… how that goes and what the connection is, I think that that connection is going to be brought out uh very strongly more to understand it in the next several uh years. I think that’s part of the… it’s, it’s an evolution that’s going to be coming out now.
Alan Steinfeld: So in a way, this is really a tool for psychics and intuitives and there’s… there’s a sort of uh information feedback that’s coming from this intelligence that, that sensitives will be able to kind of almost dialogue with. Is… are you saying that as well?
Bill Homann: Uh yeah, people that are uh you know sensitive and people are becoming more sensitive now that we’re coming into this age, uh psychability is becoming you know greatly enhanced and as that happens, they’re able to connect with the skulls more readily that skulls come to people and it will happen is probably before I come to New York, there’ll be a number of people that will have uh experiences with the skull coming to them and uh whatever depending on… even people that don’t even know they’re psychic will have that experience because I, I find all kind of like uh lectures I go to people come and say, “I don’t… didn’t know anything about skulls but this skull appeared to me and I feel I should be here.” So I’m here. And that’s I get that sometimes so.
Alan Steinfeld: I, I’m feeling that myself. So you’re saying even before you get here to New York, people are going to have an experience of the skull like a communication and an opening. That’s… that’s… that’s fantastic.
Bill Homann: Yeah. Not every one but the people… it’ll be a good number of them, yeah.
Alan Steinfeld: No, I know not everyone. But I actually feel a connection to the skull, the Mitchell-Hedges skull. I’ve seen a lot of… well not a lot, but I’ve seen a few crystal skulls that I didn’t resonate with and when I heard about this in the 80s, I guess it was, I wasn’t… there a guy Nick Nocerino who was connected with this skull?
Bill Homann: Uh yeah, back in the 80s, Nick did some tests on the skull. He did a lot of different tests and uh uh and I think he wrote a book about it and uh Frank Dorland wrote a book called Holy Ice and that was probably one of the best books as far as the knowledge of the Mitchell-Hedges skull and what’s, you know, what it’s really all about. But uh there’s there was different people that were had a chance to study it and Nick was one of the people that studied in 1987.
Alan Steinfeld: Right. I heard him speak on the radio, I guess when I heard um Anna Mitchell-Hedges talk about being a child in Mexico. But as, as soon as I heard about it and saw pictures of it, I did feel a resonance with the skull like it… like there was something of some kind of communication in that. So I’m very curious about, about seeing that and and having an experience in… because I’ve also developed whatever intuitive abilities I, I think this is… this is something that’s just accelerating everyone who probably comes in contact with it. Um.
Bill Homann: Well, I just going to say that some people are really drawn to it. You know, you might have a hundred people and of that the ones that are really drawn to it uh have that connection and it’s you know, I feel that you have that connection and I think it will really be something that you will gain a lot from in the in meeting it. So I’ll be I’ll be glad to… I think you’ll really enjoy the experience of it because it’s once you see it, you’ll never forget it. It’s something that stays with you.
Alan Steinfeld: Well I’m excited about it. But doing a television and doing a television show and showing it on camera, I think people will get a transmission by just seeing that visually. I mean if they can’t see it, you know, in person, but you know by having that that will be really exciting for people. And then I’ll be able to even put it out in a bigger way on YouTube and on television. So we can start to um really spread whatever this… because it’s a it’s a very positive force. Don’t you feel that?
Bill Homann: Oh yeah, that’s uh you know, we need positive things in the world right now, that’s for sure. And uh, you know, a lot of things are based on fear and and uh negativity and we want to open it up to to more of the joy and the hope and the possibility of good things in the future. And that’s what the what the message of the Maya and the and the message of the skulls are that there is a there is a possibility that hey, we got a lot of… we can reach this this higher uh consciousness that is right there and it’s within our reach. So.
Alan Steinfeld: So what do you think… do you think the 2012 date, the December 21st is an actual date of a shift or is it a kind of approximate day? I mean I know they say that the calendar ends, the old calendar ends and a new calendar begins, but do you think it’s a that exact date a transition will happen?
Bill Homann: Okay, well a lot of their stuff is within three seconds of being correct. So uh even after all this period of time. So they’re they’re pretty good at what they do. Uh what it is is it’s the… it’s the time when our galaxy and the planets line up with the center of the universe. That’s what happens every 26,000 years. And when that happens, then there’s a lot of things that could affect the planet. In fact, you know, they talk about pole shifts and everything. We don’t know exactly what’s going to happen, but the scientists are starting to recognize what is happening and the possibility that could happen. So uh I think with working with energies in the skulls by balancing out the energy in the world, there’s a good chance that you know, we’ll… you know, it’s like if you are out of balance and something happens, you can really go out of control. Uh so what the what the Hopi say uh is the way uh the gods will be in the past they they shook one fist and destroyed the world. Uh they say that they possibly could shake two fists this time or if mankind can reach this consciousness to open up to you know, open up their hearts to to uh unfreeze the hearts of man and open that up, there’s a good chance that we can go through it very peacefully and into the new millennium, the new time period very uh easily which I, I’d really like to see myself. I want to go through and and say, “Hey, was that… that really happened? Was that uh…” I don’t want to… I don’t want anything too bad happening. So.
Alan Steinfeld: Well I’d like to see that too. But uh is there a certain thing… I mean yes, opening the hearts and lots of people. But is there a certain thing we can do to actually make that happen? Uh is there a certain technique or?
Bill Homann: Uh you know what, I think uh it’s, it’s happening all over the world and people are becoming more consciousness of uh you know of their self, their fellow man. See what it is is uh the world evolves in a spiraling thing, it keeps spiraling. That’s evolution. And what has happened is we’ve kind of put a cap on the top of it with control of, of fear that has been spread between mankind and putting down uh the female energy in the planet where it’s been beat down instead of making it so it should be equal with the male energy. There should be a balance of yin and yang. It shouldn’t be one side is real big and the other side’s pushed down. And the women uh energy has to take responsibility for what they are. They are the priestess and the men are the priests to keep the energy uh balanced and even. And if, if that happens, then there’s a chance that we can you know, we can keep evolving. But if, if everything’s pushed down and repressed and and work with fear and hate, uh there’s the only choice we have is destruction because that’s there’s no no chance to to grow through it. But I see that there’s a lot of good things happening that we are opening up to this higher consciousness and and believing that uh you know and allowing that female energy prop coming through. That’s we’re at an age this is the age where that energy has to come has to be more prevalent and more powerful and more equal to uh the male if that happens uh there’s a good chance that a lot of uh a lot of the bad things that could happen will not happen.
Alan Steinfeld: Well it’s interesting that the skull is a female skull as well, isn’t it? So there’s a female consciousness that’s emanating from it.
Bill Homann: And I think it, it changes with the the period of time we’re in, but since that’s the time we’re in right now, I think that’s why it’s that energy is coming through that way. So I you know, hey, I’m still learning. I’m just uh you know, I like I you know, I love learning, I like learning new things. I’m not I don’t have the answers. I’m just uh kind of on a quest here and uh uh I think that–
Alan Steinfeld: It’s a fascinating quest. Yeah.
Bill Homann: Yeah. I think, you know, I believe that if uh the spirits are right, I’ll be in the proper place and the people will be in the proper place that this will come through this with uh uh with a way to be able to, hey, we got a smile on our face and a smile on our hearts and hey, we’re you know, we’ve done it. So let’s go for the let’s go for the gold. Let’s have some fun along the way. So.
Alan Steinfeld: Right. But I mean, we have to get rid of the wars and the destruction and the hatred and the violence and all the things. But that that’s happening. I think, you know, we have a president perhaps who’s who’s um, you know, at least a turn in the right direction and um, I think things are changing. So I think we do have a chance at going for the gold and and uplifting the culture and evolving consciousness. I mean, that’s why I do this program is because I know there’s a shift in the way people are thinking and listening to you and to other people who are bringing this message is how we are changing the planet together.
Bill Homann: Yeah, I think that’s what each one of us kind of do our little part and by putting the little pieces together, we’ve kind of made the puzzle and it’s so it’s kind of a it’s exciting thing. So and we’re we’re kind of uh I feel though that it’s it’s important not to say, hey, let’s do what we’re going to do next week or next month. It’s we got to start on this this quest and on this process today and keep on it because it’s it’s very important to uh to be able to uh to uh follow through. What we do is is affects so much. And I I realize if we can raise the consciousness of a small group of people, filling those people with uh universal love in their heart, it’s a very strong force that can can work on healing the people and the planet.
Alan Steinfeld: Well, we’re doing that. How long are you going to be in New York for on around April 4th?
Bill Homann: Uh just for a couple days. Yeah.
Alan Steinfeld: Are you going to do private sessions with the skull?
Bill Homann: Uh not too many, but I’ll do some. Yeah. I’ll be doing some private sessions. I I like to work with uh meditations groups with the skull. Uh we found that with that PIP camera when you do meditations, it it really uh has a neat effect. So hopefully we’ll get some uh really good opening clearing meditations and that’ll that’ll be kind of neat.
Alan Steinfeld: That that’ll be really exciting. No, I I’m I think you bringing it all over the planet and you’re going to keep going, right? From New York, you’re going uh someplace else, right? After that? You’re you’re on a world tour, right?
Bill Homann: Yeah. Well, I’ve been I’ve been doing a lot of traveling, uh going quite a few places and uh uh yeah, just it just kind of goes where it needs to so to speak. Uh I’m going to try to what I’ve kind of come to the the feeling now that I might uh I like Sedona, Arizona and I think that might be a home base for the skull because if I go out and do these lectures and maybe I only meet, you know, maybe 100 people, 500 people, whatever, uh but if I in Sedona, if it is a place where people can see and experience it, there’s uh 4 million people a year come to that area and that has special energies and stuff. So I would, you know, I’m to bring people to know more about uh FA Mitchell-Hedges, Anna Mitchell-Hedges life. FA Mitchell-Hedges uh you could do a, you know, books and books about his life, Anna’s life. They were very, very unique, very special people and they had a very special role in the world and what they, you know, and very few people know about them. So by bringing out some of the stuff about them, I’d like more and more people to understand their life and know, you know, what they were really all about. So that’s that’s one of my goals that I’m trying to to work on.
Alan Steinfeld: Wow, that would be great. I think it would be great to be in Sedona. You could like just set it up on in a kind of storefront and you know, people could pay like five dollars. You you’d be packed in Sedona. It would be it would add quite a presence to that city. I’ve spent a lot of time in Sedona and I’m familiar with the energetics there because um the iron, the red rocks create a magnetic field. So to put that skull in a huge magnetic field like Sedona will definitely it’ll definitely do something interesting, you know? Have you been to Sedona? Yeah?
Bill Homann: Oh yeah, I’ve been there a number of times and I’ve uh worked with the skull by Cathedral Rock on some of the uh some of the old Hopi property right on some of the, you know, like the summer solstices and the different uh equinoxes and different times of the year, the important times we did different ceremonies with the skull. Uh I tell you kind of tell you kind of an interesting story that I’d like to tell.
Alan Steinfeld: Yeah, tell me. Yeah.
Bill Homann: Uh see with the skull, different people are brought out. It’s kind of neat how it works. I did a uh a thing for the Sci-Fi channel last year well, year and it was uh, you know, right before the Indiana Jones was released and it was like the mystery of the skulls. It was for Sci-Fi. And what they did is they uh had me go all over Central and South Amer– Central America looking for uh just some crystal skulls and and meeting the people down there and following Mitchell-Hedges trail back through the different places. But uh there was a gentleman that saw this this movie and he he had a feeling that he needed to uh contact me and he needed to contact the skull. And he thought that’s ridiculous. He doesn’t know where I am or anything about it, the skull. And he forgot about it. That was but two weeks later I was going to this area to do a lecture and uh uh people that uh that were bringing me in uh were talking about uh Ray Brown’s orb. And Ray Brown’s orb was I think have you heard about that?
Alan Steinfeld: No. No.
Bill Homann: It was an orb that was found off the coast of Bimini back in the 70s.
Alan Steinfeld: An orb? What do you mean by an orb?
Bill Homann: Well a crystal ball. It was a little crystal ball that was found.
Alan Steinfeld: Oh, I I haven’t heard about that. Yeah.
Bill Homann: Yeah, what it was is it was kind of known back in the 70s and then uh Ray Brown passed away and he he passed on to his teacher and told him never to bring it out and never to show anybody till the right time. Well, uh the uh the gentleman had the orb and these people that were gonna bring me in started talking about it for no reason and the lady that uh was there said, hey, I know where it is but I can’t tell anybody. And they said, well, tell him, maybe he wants to know about the skull, he might want to see it. So she went to tell him and he was all excited cause he did want to see it and he was he didn’t think he ever would. So we brought the orb and the skull and we put them together uh on the the summer solstice at right at by Cathedral Rock and it was really a powerful thing. And uh the we have pictures, the skull turned white with a and had white energy shooting around it and the orb turned gold. And we have a picture of it and you can see it. I’ll bring along to show you. How’s that?
Alan Steinfeld: Wow. What happened? What happened there?
Bill Homann: Well, in our pictures, the skull turned blue and there was blue lights going all over the ground. And we had it in a uh uh conference room, the conference room was gold and the tablecloths were gold and we had the skull on the table and the orb and they took pictures with cameras and the pictures, you looked in through the viewfinder and everything was gold and the skull was okay and they took the picture and the walls turned blue, the tablecloth turned blue, and the skull turned blue and the ball and the orb turned blue. And they took numbers of pictures and every time. I have those pictures too are kind of interesting how that happened. But uh so you never know what’s going to happen with the skull and and with the orb was kind of neat. The the orb was found in a pyramid underneath the sea by these by uh Ray Brown. He was scuba diving out in that area and there was a big storm and after the storm they hit a well, they had to tie themselves to trees cause it was so bad. And after the storm they went diving and they saw at 125 feet a pyramid with a blue lapis capstone. And they went down to it and there was an opening and they went in it and it was light inside. It wasn’t dark. And they saw a gold spear with a red ruby stone on the end and there are two golden hands. And they tried to get the spear loose, they couldn’t get the spear loose, they tried to get the stone off, they couldn’t get it. But inside the hands there was a there was an orb and they picked it up and they had a like a voice said, you you got what you came for, now leave. And don’t come back. So they they got out of there quick and they left and the four other guys went back and they weren’t supposed to and they were mysteriously killed. And the only one left was Ray Brown, he had the orb. And then when he passed away, he passed it on to this gentleman. You might if you look on the web, there’s there’s still stuff wrote wrote about Ray Brown’s orb. So it’s kind of interesting.
Alan Steinfeld: I will look on that. I mean, as you’re describing this, it reminds me of when I was in India and there’s these things called these holy relics, which actually are manifestations from some divine realm and these relics do have these special healing abilities and these uh other psychic phenomena that happen around them. And this seems like a a major relic uh from some another dimension. Uh that’s what I’m getting is what you’re that’s what the feeling I’m getting.
Bill Homann: Well they they say the skulls are multi-dimensional and uh that’s why they they appear all over the place. So you uh you never know what might happen or what might get, but it’s always very positive and it’s always good for for mankind.
Alan Steinfeld: Well, Bill, I’m really, really looking forward to meeting you and of course the Mitchell-Hedges skull. Uh, I’m talking to Bill Homann who will be in New York on April 4th at a presentation that the ARE Center of New York, the Association for Research and Enlightenment, um will be doing at the church, the Community Church, which is at um 30 35 what is it? It is 40 East 35th Street in Manhattan. That’s between Park and Lexington. And the admission there is um $35. And if you pre-register, it’s $30 uh if you pre-register before March 21st. Um and you will be doing private sessions. If you want to call the ARE um to pre-register call 212-691-7690. Uh any final words Bill about anything Anna Mitchell-Hedges told you about the skull any special teachings that you just want to leave the audience with?
Bill Homann: Well, let’s see. Well, one of the things that Mitchell-Hedges would always say and I’ll just like to say that is a life without zest and adventure is a life not worth living. So he was a person that enjoyed adventure and he he took life into the fullest and I think uh that’s the a good way to you can have adventures in all different ways, but a matter of fact is to find life uh find out what you really want in life and go after it. That’s what uh that’s what uh makes uh the fullness of what we’re here really here all about. So have a good adventure and I’m looking forward to seeing you out there in in New York.
Alan Steinfeld: Well definitely, definitely. And thank you for the work. I mean you are truly a servant of consciousness it seems like. You’re just doing this because this is what needs to be done really. I mean um.
Bill Homann: Well you try to follow your heart and you know, that’s that’s what I believe in and if I believe in something, I go for it. And I’m doing doing the best I can, I’m still learning all the time. So having fun.
Alan Steinfeld: Well you seem like a very humble person, Bill.
Bill Homann: So I just enjoying it and doing the best you can do. That’s all you can do.
Alan Steinfeld: Well, thanks for talking uh on New Realities cause this has really been a new reality. And um I’ll report to people what my immediate impressions of the crystal skull are. Uh this is Alan Steinfeld for New Realities and if you want to reach me, email me at newrealities.com, check out my website where this interview will be posted as well as on BBSradio.com and also go to newrealities.com.
In the public imagination, “abduction” is a single story with a single cast: a startled person, a silent room, a paralyzing presence, a bright light, and a medical procedure performed by strangers with too-large eyes.
But the historical record suggests something more interesting. “Abduction” is not one narrative. It is an evolving genre, with a surprisingly stable backbone and a set of motifs that mutate with technology, media, language, and social permission.
A folklorist who analyzed hundreds of abduction reports argued that many accounts share a recurring “plot” that behaves less like random nightmare fragments and more like a structured experience report.
In a large sample, a core sequence (capture → examination → conference/communication → tour → return) appears with notable consistency, including cases that do not contain every element. (Academia)
That alone does not settle what the phenomenon “is.” But it does give us something rare in UAP studies: an observable pattern with enough repetition to track over time.
This article takes a data-first approach to one question: how did abduction narratives become what they are now, and what stayed constant as everything else changed?
The Manhattan Alien Abduction, docudrama series, is an alleged event from 1989 involving Linda Napolitano, who claims aliens abducted her from her NYC apartment; Linda with the help of Budd Hopkins investigates this “true story” but remains unverified, controversial, and debated as potentially a hoax or a genuine experience, with claims supported by UFO researcher Budd Hopkins but lacking independent proof, leading to legal action and skepticism. (Netflix)
The measurable core
Before we jump across decades, we need a baseline: what counts as an “abduction narrative” when you treat it as data rather than folklore or entertainment?
Baseline findings from large comparative work
A comparative study of abduction reports (hundreds of cases) describes:
A repeatable structure that often begins with a “capture” (frequently with paralysis or forced movement), followed by a “medical examination” scene, then a communication or “conference,” sometimes a “tour,” and finally a “return.” (Academia)
A strong tendency toward humanoid entities. In one summarized statistic, roughly two-thirds of a 203-case subset favored humanoid beings over non-humanoid forms. (Academia)
Recurring aftermath themes: physical symptoms (including marks and pain), psychological disturbance, and social isolation. (Academia)
The population-survey detour: big numbers, big arguments
In the early 1990s, abduction research briefly attempted to become demography.
A privately published report based on a Roper Organization survey of 5,947 adult Americans framed “five indicator experiences” (including missing time, waking paralysis with a sensed presence, and other anomalies) as potentially related to abduction claims.
The report states the incidence of abduction-related experiences appeared to be “on the order of at least 2%,” and it explicitly compares the symptom cluster to post-trauma effects.
But critics highlighted a crucial methodological fault line: the leap from “indicator experiences” to “probable abductees.” In a Skeptical Inquirer critique, the authors argue that the survey’s interpretive jump goes beyond what the questions can validate, noting that “no evidence is presented” that the five questions measure abduction.
This dispute matters historically because it marks a turning point: abduction narratives became not just testimonies, but numbers. That shift changed media coverage, therapy culture, and even how experiencers described themselves.
A working timeline of abduction storytelling
Below is a practical, research-oriented model of how the abduction narrative evolved. Think of it as an “interface history”: the underlying experience may be stable, but the way people encode, recall, and report it shifts.
Era
Dominant frame
Signature motifs that rise
What stays stubbornly constant
Pre-1947
Otherworld / spirit capture
missing time, “other realm,” enforced journeys
paralysis/immobility, time distortion, taboo secrecy
cohort similarity, disruption of identity and belief
2000s–present
Experiencer pluralism
consciousness models, support groups, online communities
core motifs persist while interpretation diversifies
.
Before “abduction”: older templates for forced contact
If you strip away the spacecraft interior, many older traditions already contain something structurally similar to “abduction”: a person is immobilized or compelled, taken to a strange place, exposed to non-human agents, returned with altered time, and warned not to speak.
Modern researchers sometimes treat that resemblance as proof that abduction reports are “just folklore.” But the better data-first reading is subtler:
The resemblance shows that human cultures already had narrative containers for anomalous, intrusive encounters.
Those containers provide language for events that are difficult to process or describe.
The persistence of certain motifs across centuries (paralysis, time distortion, forced movement, altered perception, taboo secrecy) is exactly what you’d expect if a stable stimulus meets a culturally variable interpretive layer.
In other words: similarity to folklore does not disprove the phenomenon. It may describe the cognitive and cultural “codec” humans use to report it.
The 1950s contactee era: abduction as conversation, not violation
A key shift in the mid-20th century is that “contact” becomes public-facing and ideologically explicit. A sociological overview of the contact movement notes that early 1950s claims of extended contact were “entirely different” from later frightening abduction tales, and it frames the history as a series of changing paradigms about who the visitors are and why they come. (Chapman University Digital Commons)
Why does this matter for abduction evolution?
Because it suggests the phenomenon (or at least the reporting of it) moved from:
message-centered encounters (“they warned us about nuclear weapons”) to
procedure-centered encounters (“they examined me, took samples, and returned me”).
That pivot is one of the most important “genre rewrites” in modern UAP culture.
1957–1966: the prototype modern abduction hardens
Witness accounts as scaffolding
Whether you treat them as literal events, altered-state experiences, or something in-between, several mid-century cases functioned as scaffolding for the modern abduction story.
The Roper-based report explicitly claims that “before 1966” only one abduction report (the Antônio Villas-Boas case in Brazil) appeared in the UAP literature, and that publication of John G. Fuller’s Interrupted Journey (about Betty and Barney Hill) sharply increased awareness. It also notes the 1973 Pascagoula case (Hickson and Parker) as a later national publicity spike.
The Hill case and hypnosis: a double-edged accelerator
The Hill story became a template not only because of what was reported, but because of how it was retrieved: hypnotic regression.
A major documentary-style podcast series recounts that, more than two years after the 1961 encounter, Betty and Barney Hill underwent hypnosis sessions with psychiatrist Dr. Benjamin Simon, which revealed additional claimed memories. (iHeart)
This created a feedback loop that shaped abduction narrative evolution:
experiencers report missing time, dreams, anxiety
investigators propose regression to “recover” memory
future experiencers, trying to interpret something anomalous, now have a culturally available script
That does not mean later experiencers copied earlier ones. It means abduction narratives acquired a shared vocabulary and a recognizable structure.
The 1970s: missing time becomes the organizing principle
The 1970s are where abduction becomes a field with methods, not just stories.
Two major forces converge:
investigative networks and case cataloging
regression hypnosis as a widespread technique
The Roper-based report’s bibliography lists Budd Hopkins’ Missing Time (1981) and Intruders (1987) as core texts in this research arc, reflecting how “missing time” became a central diagnostic clue rather than a footnote.
In this period, abduction reports also stabilize around repeated procedural elements. The comparative folklorist model (capture → examination → conference → tour → return) is exactly what investigators were now trained to listen for. (Academia)
The 1980s: mainstreaming, the “Grey,” and the bedroom
The 1980s are not just a decade of new reports. They are a decade of narrative standardization.
Three dynamics intensify:
The bedroom setting rises Road encounters never vanish, but the bedroom becomes the iconic theater. Paralysis and a sensed presence, already present in older traditions, now integrate seamlessly into modern abduction reporting.
The entity taxonomy tightens Humanoids dominate many reports, but now one subtype becomes culturally central: the small, large-eyed “Grey.” (UAPedia treats entity categories as reported descriptions, not settled zoology.) The comparative literature notes the broad dominance of humanoids in report sets. (Academia)
Support culture begins With stigma still high, experiencers gravitate toward semi-private networks and specialist investigators rather than conventional institutions.
The 1990s: trauma frameworks, academic attention, and reproductive themes
By the 1990s, abduction narratives acquire two new layers:
clinical language (trauma, dissociation, post-trauma symptom clusters)
The Roper-based report explicitly frames abduction aftermath as “symptoms akin to post-traumatic stress,” including sleep disturbances and disturbing dreams. This became a powerful rhetorical bridge: it let mental health professionals consider experiencers without immediately pathologizing them, while also giving experiencers a language for what they felt.
John E. Mack and institutional friction
A major moment in the evolution of abduction discourse was the controversy around Harvard psychiatrist John E. Mack. Contemporary reporting described a Harvard Medical School “fact-finding” inquiry into his work on abduction claims. (The Harvard Crimson) Another higher-education outlet later reported that Harvard ultimately took no action against him while the episode raised debates about academic freedom and evidentiary standards. (The Chronicle of Higher Education)
Whatever one thinks of Mack’s conclusions, historically he mattered because he made “abduction testimony” legible in elite institutional language. That changed who would speak, and how.
The “Roper moment”: when abduction became a statistic
The early 1990s Roper-based report is historically pivotal because it tried to treat abduction as a prevalence problem rather than an anecdote problem.
Key points from the report itself:
It is presented as data from “three national surveys” totaling nearly 6,000 adults.
It states it is “funded” privately, “published privately,” and intended for mass distribution to mental health professionals.
It lists headline indicator percentages, such as “waking up paralyzed with sense of strange figure” (18%) and “missing time” (13%).
Key points from major published criticism:
The critique argues that the inference to “probable abductees” lacks validated measurement, stating “no evidence is presented for the validity” of the key questions.
It highlights how the “3.7 million” number is an extrapolation from the survey’s internal definitions rather than a direct finding.
In terms of narrative evolution, the effect was enormous: abduction shifted from a story you heard to a phenomenon you might statistically “be part of.”
2000s to present: the experiencer era and the rise of community infrastructure
If the 1990s tried to make abduction respectable through academia and surveys, the 2000s and 2010s made it survivable through communities.
Today, experiencer-focused organizations provide support and peer dialogue without demanding a single explanatory model:
MUFON Experiencer Resource Team (ERT) describes itself as “dedicated to helping experiencers of alien contact” and routes people through a confidential questionnaire. (MUFON)
OPUS (Organization for Paranormal Understanding and Support) positions itself as a long-running support and education network for experiencers, stating it has provided support for “more than 30 years.” (OPUS Network)
John E. Mack Institute community groups explicitly offer group dialogue for people processing extraordinary experiences and shifting worldviews. (johnemackinstitute.org)
The Experiencer Group (TEG) presents itself as a private member community for those who have lived through anomalous events, emphasizing support and curiosity. (TheExperiencerGroup)
uNHIdden (experiencer group) medically led, stigma-reduction and care-focused nonprofit. Unhidden
Podcasts as the new folklore engine
In previous eras, books and talk shows shaped abduction narratives. Now podcasts do.
Strange Arrivals devotes a major season to the Hill case and explicitly foregrounds the hypnosis sessions that produced the deeper abduction storyline. (iHeart)
Somewhere in the Skies regularly covers “alien abduction” episodes as a recurring theme, including episodes focused on 1970s-era files. (somewhereintheskies.com)
Cosmosis (formerly The UFO Rabbit Hole) positions itself explicitly at the intersection of UAP, consciousness, and the paranormal, and is co-hosted by a director of The Experiencer Group. (Apple Podcasts)
Whitley Strieber, known for his influential 1987 book Communion, continues to champion the experiencer’s inner life and consciousness through his podcast, Dreamland. This platform treats extraordinary events as an ongoing philosophical dialogue, prioritizing their impact on identity and worldview—a focus on experiencer pluralism—over purely investigative or skeptical analysis.
This matters because narrative evolution is not only about what happened to experiencers. It is also about the media channel through which experiencers learn they are not alone.
Hypnosis, memory, and the evolution of “detail”
No discussion of historical evolution is complete without the mechanism that produced much of the detail: hypnosis.
Mainstream psychology does not treat hypnosis as a guaranteed truth-recovery tool. An APA article on hypnosis summarizes the field’s caution: hypnosis is not universally accepted as producing reliable memory, and it is often unclear when hypnosis increases accuracy versus confidence. (American Psychological Association) Research coverage also warns hypnosis can increase confidence in inaccurate memories even when accuracy does not improve. (Ohio State News)
This creates a tension that shaped the entire abduction era:
regression produced coherent narratives and helped experiencers integrate disturbing experiences
regression also raised legitimate concerns about suggestion, confabulation, and over-interpretation
A data-first posture does not require choosing one side. It requires tagging the epistemic status of information. That is what we do next.
What changed, what persisted
Persistent “hard motifs” (cross-decade)
These appear repeatedly in large comparative sets and across multiple decades:
the social script (silence and shame → investigator networks → experiencer identity and community)
Implications: why the evolution itself is evidence
If abduction narratives were purely random or purely invented, you would expect either chaos (no stable core) or total conformity (a single script). Instead, the historical record suggests:
a stable backbone (repeatable structure and aftermath themes) (Academia)
institutional friction (academia and psychology respond unevenly, sometimes defensively) (The Harvard Crimson)
growth of parallel care systems (support groups, experiencer-centered orgs, and long-form media) (OPUS Network)
From an investigative standpoint, that pattern is provocative: it resembles how humans report a persistent, difficult-to-measure stimulus over time. The stimulus may be external, internal, or both. But the reporting behavior looks organized.
Speculation labels
Hypothesis
The abduction narrative functions like a “translation layer” between a persistent anomalous interaction and the experiencer’s cultural vocabulary. The core motifs persist, while surface imagery updates to match the era’s technology and fears.
A subset of abduction events may be trans-medium UAP contact episodes that include altered-state effects (immobility, time distortion, memory disruption), producing a mixed “physical + cognitive” signature.
Witness Interpretation
Many experiencers interpret the procedural elements (exams, sampling, reproductive themes) as evidence of an organized, long-term non-human program.
Some experiencers interpret the communication element as telepathic instruction, warning, or moral messaging rather than clinical interaction.
Researcher Opinion
Investigators who foreground pattern consistency argue the structured plot across hundreds of reports is itself a kind of evidence. (Academia)
Critics argue that methods like hypnosis and culturally available scripts can manufacture coherence, and that population-survey extrapolations are not validated measurement.
Claims taxonomy
Verified
Abduction reports, when analyzed in large comparative sets, often share a structured sequence (capture → examination → communication → return) and recurring motifs. (Academia)
A privately published, Roper-based report exists that surveyed 5,947 adult Americans and framed “indicator experiences” as potentially related to abduction reports.
Experiencer-focused support organizations and communities currently operate and explicitly state support missions (MUFON ERT, OPUS, John E. Mack Institute groups, The Experiencer Group). (MUFON)
Probable
The shift from contactee-style narratives (1950s) to fear- and procedure-centered abduction narratives reflects changing paradigms inside UAP culture and reporting. (Chapman University Digital Commons)
Disputed
The extrapolation from survey indicator responses to “millions of probable abductees” is methodologically contested in published critique.
Bader, C. (1995). The UAP contact movement from the 1950’s to the present. Studies in Popular Culture, 17(2), 73–90. (Abstract accessed via Chapman University Digital Commons.) (Chapman University Digital Commons)
Bullard, T. E. (1989). UFO abduction reports: The supernatural kidnap narrative returns in technological guise. Journal of American Folklore. (Accessed via Academia.edu mirror.) (Academia)
Hopkins, B., Jacobs, D. M., & Westrum, R. (1992). The UFO abduction syndrome: A report on unusual experiences associated with UFO abductions, based upon the Roper Organization’s survey of 5,947 adult Americans. (Privately published report; PDF scan).
Stires, L., & Klass, P. J. (1993). 3.7 million Americans kidnapped by aliens? Critiquing the “Unusual Personal Experiences” survey. Skeptical Inquirer, 17(2).
The British Psychological Society. (2017). False memories of childhood abuse (discussion of hypnosis-guided recovery risks and cautions). (British Psychophysical Society)
The Ohio State University News. (2001, August 21). Hypnosis may give false confidence in inaccurate memories. (Ohio State News)
The Harvard Crimson. (1995, April 17). Mack’s research is under scrutiny. (The Harvard Crimson)
The Chronicle of Higher Education. (1995, August 11). Harvard takes no action against controversial UFO researcher. (The Chronicle of Higher Education)
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