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'UFOs : The Secret Evidence' is a 2 hour television programme set out to solve some of the great UFO mysteries, perhaps even provide a catch-all explanation for the whole field of Ufology. 'UFOs: The Secret Evidence' was written and presented by journalist Nick Cook, who has been an aviation editor and aerospace consultant for the world-renowned trade publication "Jane's Defence Weekly". His impeccable credentials might suggest a rather stuffy approach to the subject, but Nick Cook actually brings with him a down-to-earth, common sense approach which is refreshing. His stance on UFOs seems open-minded and objective. He also manages to gain interviews with some very intriguing individuals from the aerospace and intelligence fields.




The programme started by asserting that UFO reports began during the Second World War. This is an incorrect assertion, unfortunately, ignoring a wealth of historical evidence dating back centuries. Still, it's probably fair to say that the first official military reports on the subject were generated in the 1940s, and that is the focus of Nick's investigation. He tackled the phenomenon of the 'Foo Fighters' reported by airmen during WWII and, with John Dering (a senior scientist at SARA), considered the possibility that the Nazis were sending up prototype Unmanned Aerial Vehicles which were "reusable"!

A bizarre technological artefact known as 'the Fly Trap' was visited, and the theory that it was a test-rig for Nazi flying saucers was discussed. This was in the context of a secret Nazi underground base where derro-like scientists played with glowing bell-shaped devices which seemed to defy gravity. This was research which led to the death of several scientists, allegedly.

Brigadier General Roger Ramey and Colonel Thomas J. BuBose with the Roswell 'wreakage' Then we moved onto the Roswell incident, via the infamous U.S. defence programme to incorporate Nazi scientists into sensitive research areas (like White Sands Missile Range), known as Operation Paperclip. The Roswell incident resulted, it was alleged, from a top secret defence programme known as 'Sky Hook', which sent up advanced surveillance balloons. Its flight path took it over Roswell, and when one crashed the UFO story was sprung to hide the truth about 'Sky Hook' from the Soviets.

This is a running theme throughout Nick Cook's thesis. Whatever the truth behind the wider phenomenon, the subject was used mercilessly by intelligence agencies in the psychological war with the Soviet Union. This occurred to such an extent that UFOs became part of American culture for a long while; as a propaganda instrument UFOs were unrivalled in their success, it was claimed. Not only that, but the U.S. then used UFO flaps as a means to track the progress of their experimental craft.

It all sounds like those clever military intelligence people had their finger on the pulse all along! This rose-tinted view of UFO history, US of A-style, was backed up by various characters from the Intelligence field interviewed by Nick Cook, who all smiled knowingly as they openly revealed the deepest secrets of military intelligence to the public. "We suckered you all, you fools!" they arrogantly insinuated. But this version of history runs against the grain of the U.S. Government's public panic over the subject at the time, as revealed in various memos that have come to light.

After the death of the brutal Soviet premier Joseph Stalin, the CIA upped the ante, using UFOs as a propaganda tool to cover up the top secret flights of the U2 spy-plane over the Soviet Union. It didn't work, of course, because the Soviets shot one down. One would have expected the UFO phenomenon to stop dead in its tracks at that point. But, no, on it went, cruelly ignoring the whole CIA/Propaganda theory.

So various other aerospace oddities are wheeled out of their hangers to shock and amaze us. Like the 'Avro Car', and the 'Silver Bug'. There is something to be said for the idea that sightings of UFOs at or near sensitive aerospace research establishments might just have something to do with what's going on there. Policeman Lonnie Zamora might have seen a 'Silver Bug', or a downed prototype Sampler destined for the Moon, next to White Sands, for instance.

The Russians certainly seemed to be well and truly hooked on UFOs, with Andropov ordering the Red Army to watch the skies, which they did dutifully for 13 years. But the canny Russians would have known that the Americans liked to regularly risk their young pilots on surveillance missions across Soviet territory, despite already having spy satellite technology quite sufficient for the task. There's more to all this than meets the eye. Yes, Stealth aircraft undoubtedly contributed to UFO sightings. But that's not the whole story.

And Nick Cook seems to realise that too. The first hint of that came when watching the uncomfortable reaction of British sceptics Andy Roberts and Dave Clarke to his gentle questioning. They were not amongst friends, one could judge. Then his appraisal of the eye-witness account of pilot Tom Hanley, who described the incredible manoeuvring capability of an unidentified flying object darting around his reconnaissance aircraft, seemed to open up greater potentials than the US military dangerously interfering with its own advanced aircraft.

The 1952 flap over Washington D.C. also brought about a pause for thought. Nick Cook is not a dyed-in-the-wool sceptic by any means.

He then tackled subsidiary subjects, like cattle mutilations across stretches of the continental USA. He concluded that these were covert missions carried out by military agents using helicopters and field-based surgical equipment, to monitor contamination levels of some kind. It would have been easier to just buy some cattle and then take body parts to the lab for analysis, I'd have thought. But ten out of ten for style, that's for sure.



Then there was the alien abduction phenomenon, which is a massive subject in its own right. Nick Cook looked at the Travis Walton case, including an excellent interview with the man himself. No explanation was forthcoming, except for a generalised gloss over the experiences of the Contactees some years before. Perhaps to try to indict the U.S. Government in human experiments against the will, or knowledge, of the victims involved, was a step too far for Cook. The U.S. Government's dismissive contempt for the great, impoverished mass of its own people has been clear to see for many years, most recently noted during the Hurricane Katrina debacle. So it's possible, surely?

'UFOs: The Secret Evidence" wound up with a look at satellite photographs showing contrails from an unidentified craft which flew halfway across the globe at 8000mph. 'Aurora' was the modern UFO par excellence, it seems. But however fast these things get, the fact remains that the difficulty with identifying many UFOs lies in their bizarre patterns of manoeuvrability. If the Nazis created the Foo Fighters back in the 1940s, then why the heck are we still flying around in fixed wing aircraft 60 years later? It all seems so unlikely. Yes, UFOs were a wonderful cover story to hide black projects behind, but the black projects in themselves do not completely solve the UFO problem. Not by a long chalk. In the end, Nick Cook seemed to agree.

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In 1938, Albert Hofmann (January 11, 1906 – April 29, 2008) was working as a research chemist at the laboratory of the Sandoz company in Basel, Switzerland, where he began studying the medicinal properties of plants. He was studying the alkaloid compounds of ergot, a fungus which forms on rye.

This poisonous fungus that grows on rye had been used for centuries as a folk remedy to bring on childbirth and ease headaches. The doctor believed that ergot could be a storehouse of new medicines, and he set about synthesizing new chemicals from it. In 1938, Hofmann had synthesized the 25th chemical: lysergic acid diethylamide. It showed little effect in test animals, bar restlessness, and it was shelved.




Five years later, on a hunch - or a "peculiar presentiment", as Hofmann puts it - he brewed up a fresh batch. In the process, he was overcome by dizziness. Sent home, he "sank into a not unpleasant intoxicated-like condition, characterised by an extremely stimulated imagination".

The next day, Hofmann concluded that the sensations could only have been caused by accidental exposure to something in his lab, perhaps the LSD. To be sure, the cautious doctor gave himself an extremely conservative amount of the chemical - 250 millionths of a gram. It was, in fact, the equivalent of a megadose of the mind-agent, still one of the most powerful known to man.
Albert Hofmann began his historic 'Bicycle Ride' back home when he realized the world had changed dramatically. The smallest of dozes began to show in the vivid patterns and colors he saw in the changing landscapes as he made his way home.

"Everything in my field of vision wavered and was distorted as if seen in a curved mirror," said Albert Hofmann." I had the feeling that I could not move from the spot. I was cycling, cycling, but the time seemed to stand still." It was 1943, and Hofmann was experiencing the world's first LSD trip.

By the time the frightened 37-year-old research chemist reached home, he was terrified. The room spun. The walls rippled. His worried neighbour who offered him a glass of milk had horrifically transformed as well. He felt like he was dying. After a few hours, the intensity of the experimental drug he'd dosed himself with fell and he was able to enjoy the "fantastic and impressive" effects. Next day, he felt wonderful as he took a walk in the wilderness ... feeling oneness with everything around him ... "A sensation of wellbeing and renewed life flowed through me. The world was as if newly created." LSD's effects did not come as much of a revelation to science. Such psyche-manifesting agents, or "psychedelics", were already well known. Mescaline had been discovered in the late 1800s and made famous in 1954 as the subject of Aldous Huxley's book The Doors of Perception. What was extraordinary about LSD was its power. It was about 10,000 times more powerful than mescaline, and a tiny amount was enough to trigger profound alterations in consciousness.

Soon, LSD caused a revolution in psychiatry. Therapists and doctors used it to treat forms of mental illness, including neurosis, psychosis and depression. More than 40,000 people underwent psychedelic therapy. Respected figures considered it a wonder drug and gave their careers over to LSD research. By 1965, more than 2,000 papers had been published, many reporting extremely positive outcomes in treating anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder and alcoholism. Hofmann's vision of LSD as a "medicine for the soul" seemed to be coming to fruition. LSD began to leak out into élite society. Artists, painters, performers and musicians began to experiment with it in looser, less formal contexts. Anaïs Nin, Ken Kesey, Allen Ginsberg and Huxley all explored its creative potential. Huxley believed such drugs gave normal people the gift of the spontaneous visionary experience usually reserved for mystics and saints.


The public grew more and more curious about this "miracle drug". Self-experimentation began to increase. In a society facing growing industrialisation and urbanisation, alienation and boredom, everyone wanted to be reborn. Already, a counterculture had sprung up to oppose the wealth-driven homogeneity of capitalist America. LSD was rapidly adopted as the sacrament for this bohemian "hippie" movement. In the age of the moon landings and the exploration of space, here was a tool that allowed a similar, metaphorical journey, a short cut to enlightenment. By the mid-1960s, the drug was booming. Hofmann remembers the time distinctly. "I had not expected that LSD, with its unfathomable, uncanny, profound effects, so unlike the character of a recreational drug, would ever find worldwide use as an inebriant. People had the mistaken opinion that it would be sufficient simply to take LSD in order to have such miraculous effects." Rampant use led inevitably to "bad trips" among recreational users, and Hofmann could only watch with a mixture of astonishment and dismay. "They did not use it in the right way, and they did not have the right conditions.



So they were not adequately prepared for it," he says. "It is such a delicate and deep experience, if used the right way." He was stricken by doubt and concern that misuse and fear of the drug would lead to it being taken out of the hands of responsible investigators and psychiatrists. Would LSD - the drug which, on that spring day in 1943, reconnected Hofmann with the "deeply euphoric" visionary encounters he'd experienced in nature as a boy - become a blessing for humanity, or a curse? A curse, the authorities concluded. In 1966, the drug was outlawed around the world. Psychiatric treatment continued but was steadily throttled by red tape and LSD's reputation as an "insanity drug". By the 1970s, research had stopped altogether. Today, it languishes in near obscurity, banished to the fringes of science and society. " Wrong and inappropriate use has caused LSD to become my problem child," he says. "The history of LSD to date amply demonstrates the catastrophic consequences that can ensue when its profound effect is misjudged and the substance is mistaken for a pleasure drug." He took the drug many times. He believed it to be just another means to attain extraordinary states of consciousness. " Breathing techniques, yoga, fasting, dance, art " , he said were equally good. He took pleasure in recalling his boyhood experiences in nature that he linked with psychedelics. " LSD brings about a reduction of intellectual powers in favour of an emotional experiencing of the world. It can help to refill our consciousness with this feeling of wholeness and being one with nature."


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This literary and metaphysical epic unifies the cosmological phenomena of our time - from crop circles to quantum mechanics to the worldwide resurgence of shamanism - in support of the Mayan prophecy that the year 2012 portends an unprecedented global shift.

Cross Umberto Eco, Aldous Huxley, and Carlos Castaneda and you get the voice of Daniel Pinchbeck. And yet nothing quite prepares you for the lucidity, rationality, and informed audacity of this seeker, skeptic, and cartographer of hidden realms.

In tracing the meaning of the end of the Mayan Calendar in 2012, and the imminent transition from one world to another prophesied by the Hopi Indians of Arizona, Pinchbeck synthesizes indigenous cosmology, alien abductions, shamanic revivalism, crop circles, psychedelic visions, the current ecological crisis and the Judeo-Christian Apocalypse into a new vision for our time. The result is an unprecedented and riveting inquiry into where humanity is immediately headed - and its strange and startling congruence with the ideas of the mysterious civilization of the Classical Maya.

Throughout the 1990s, Pinchbeck had been a member of New York's literary select. He wrote for publications like ArtForum, Esquire, and The New York Times Magazine. Critics acclaimed his first book, Breaking Open the Head, as the most significant contribution to psychedelic literature since the work of Terence McKenna.

But the unexpected occurred: Pinchbeck found himself increasingly pulled into the shamanic and metaphysical realms he was reporting on as a journalist. As his mind opened to new and sometimes threatening experiences, disparate threads and synchronicities made new sense: Humanity, every sign suggested, faces an imminent decision between greater self-potential and environmental ruin. The Mayan "birth date" of 2012 could herald the close of one way of existence and the beginning of another, symbolized by the prophesied return of the Mesoamerican deity Quetzalcoatl, the mysterious "Plumed Serpent" of ancient myth. In just the nick of time, the skeptical modern mind can reclaim the suppressed psychic, intuitive, and mystical dimensions of being, and institute a new planetary culture. But it is only - and by no means assuredly - possible if we confront the environmental catastrophe staring us in the face.

Something is in the air: many, if not most, of us feel that real change - for good or ill - is afoot. Pinchbeck's journey - a metaphysical opus that takes the reader from the endangered rain forests of the Amazon, to the stone megaliths of the English plains, to the Burning Man festival in the Black Rock desert of Nevada - tells the tale of a single man in whose trials we ultimately recognize our own secret thoughts and unease over modern life. And a redemptive vision of where we are heading.

Reviews :

"Daniel Pinchbeck's 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl is a dazzling kaleidoscopic journey through the quixotic hinterlands of consciousness, crop circles, and ancient prophecy, as well as an intriguing and deeply personal odyssey of transformation. 2012 presents a compelling and complex teleological argument, weaving together the twilit realms of the human imagination and the harsh realities of accelerated global catastrophe. Its conclusions are surprisingly robust, original, and thankfully optimistic."
- Sting

"A daring and intriguing, sometimes deeply disturbing, very well researched and extremely readable book that puts an entirely new slant on 2012. From quantum physics to aliens, from crop circles to reincarnation, from shamanic hallucinogens to Rudolf Steiner, from the Amazon jungle to Stonehenge, from fragments of jaundiced autobiography to the ending of worlds, Pinchbeck takes us on a mind-bending, paradigm-rattling ride."
- Graham Hancock

"Few things are more difficult to convey in writing than the epiphanic drug experience or the mystical vision, and it is to Pinchbeck's credit as a writer that he is able to articulate these visions so clearly and memorably."
_ Geoff Dyer, Los Angeles Times

"Pinchbeck's reporting is fascinating and entertaining." - Brian Doherty, Washington Post Book World (front page)

"The author is not some hippy-dippy hedonist staggering down the road of excess but rather a skeptical philosopher of consciousness seeking the enlightened path." - Troy Patterson, Entertainment Weekly

Daniel Pinchbeck has also received some typical media sensationalized reviews as well particularly from the Rolling Stone to which Daniel responds ...

I was delighted that Rolling Stone found my work significant enough to deserve feature coverage. Unfortunately, the piece [RS 1008] was full of inaccuracies and outright abrications on a factual level, as well as sensationalist distortions of my ideas. To take a few examples, the first and last scenes never actually happened. We did not visit “a bunch of people on dimethyltryptamine,” I had not seen a “downtown rock show with Moby” the night before, and there was no woman groaning on a futon. I do not have “buck teeth.” Similarly, the scene described at the end never occurred-I don’t even own a copy of The Lion King.

I found the writer’ loose relationship to truth particularly depressing when she attempted to define my ideas. I am not “actively bidding to become [my] generation’s Timothy Leary”-in fact I critique Leary quite harshly in my first book. In my work, I don’t advocate mass use of psychedelics as Leary did, and certainly do not consider them to be “the answer.”

In 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl, I do not argue that “the world as we know it is about to end-on December 21, 2012.” My hypothesis is that we are already in an accelerated process of consciousness evolution, and I explore the possibility that the Mayan Calendar is, as Carl Johan Calleman describes in The Mayan Calendar and the Transformation of Consciousness, a “timetable” for understanding this process.

I most emphatically do not argue or think that “only the psychedelic elite and those who have reached a kind of supramental consciousness” will “be saved in 2012.” I do think that a deep transformation in the mindset of those who hold power in the modern West is necessary if we are going to avert disaster in the next few years, as we approach resource depletion and biospheric collapse.

In the future, it would be wonderful to see a magazine with the rich legacy of Rolling Stone approach the living currents of the intellectual counterculture of the 1950s and 60s with far more grace, integrity, and sophistication.

Quetzalcoatl


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! am another yourself


In Mayan tradition, there is a greeting that many people working with Mayan wisdom know of. It is the law of In Lak'ech Ala K'in, which means I am another yourself (A modern day interpretation). It also means I am you, and you are me (A traditional Mayan interpretation). We have come to understand that this Mayan greeting is an honoring for each other. It is a statement of unity and oneness. In Lak'ech Ala K'in mirrors the same sediment of other beautiful greetings such as Namaste for East India, Wiracocha for the Inca, and Mitakuye Oyasin for the Lakota. It doesn't matter which culture you come from. But when one of these sacred greetings is given, there is always an action of placing the hands over the heart.

The more I walk the Mayan path, the more I understand the depth that In Lak'ech Ala K'in teaches. This greeting has become more than a simple, honorable Maya greeting. It has evolved into a moral code, and a way to create a positive reality for all life. As we near 2012 with all its doom and gloom prophecies, we have a moral obligation to Spirit to live the code of In Lak'ech Ala K'in.



It is common knowledge these days that every action we take in our lives affects all living things. We understand that if we act negatively, our actions impact all life negatively. When we act positively, we affect all life in a positive manner. When we live the Mayan code of In Lak'ech Ala K'in, we know that every action we take is out of respect for all life, and we are living and giving from our hearts.

We can give our hearts in a positive manner every day by saying In Lak'ech Ala K'in to each other, to the trees, to the sky, to the birds, and to the stars. You can greet each sunrise by saying In Lak'ech Ala K'in. Each and every day we have together is sacred, so acknowledge this day by giving it your heart. Remember when you give in this way, you are also giving to yourself ! You are not giving your energy away to something separate from yourself. You are giving to another part of yourself !

I understand the challenges in staying positive in these days where the energy is so compressed that we can hardly breathe, but there is one simple exercise that can turn it all around for us. Each day, simply walk in gratefulness. We can say In Lak'ech Ala K'in to that which gives us life everyday, and that is the heart of the Great Spirit. Instead of solely taking from the Great Spirit by asking for insight and direction, give back your heart, love, and appreciation. You will be amazed at the results. If we open our hearts and send gratitude, it opens all doors that were previously closed to us. Remember you are a part of Great Spirit ! When you give to Great Spirit you are giving to yourself.

We can practice In Lak'ech Ala K'in tirelessly, because when and what we give to others is giving energy to ourselves. When we give, we receive. So how do we know if we giving right ? It is really simple. When we are energized by our giving, we know we are giving from our hearts and from the code of In Lak'ech Ala K'in. If we feel drained or exhausted, it is possible that we gave out of fear, lack, obligation, ego, or a need to be accepted or liked. The more one practices In Lak'ech Ala K'in, the clearer we will become about our motivations regarding our actions, and the more we will receive. Remember . . . what goes around comes around exactly the way it was sent out. If you don't like what life is sending to you, look at what you are sending out to life.

When we begin to live and practice In Lak'ech Ala K'in, a lot of our old ways of doing things will no longer work for us. For instance, we cannot act like victims anymore, and we cannot live out of fear either. We find ourselves no longer preparing for disaster; instead we anticipate a glorious future. It is time for us to rewrite the prophecies. They have become obsolete. The past will become just a bad dream, and the future will become a beautiful vision of which we will create right now.

When we practice In Lak'ech Ala K'in, we quit being neutral in our world, because we understand that Spirit works with those that take action. We begin to take action by adding to the positive experience of this dimension. So what kind of world do you want ? Don't just stand there waiting for the world to appear in front of you. Spirit helps those who help themselves. It is up to us.

When we practice the moral code of In Lak'ech Ala K'in, we are producing and sending positive and vital energy that can literally transform our troubled world into Paradise. When we live from In Lak'ech Ala K'in, we are putting to use our natural ability to create our reality. We are affecting the collective consciousness of humanity in a positive way. The Cosmic Maya, also known as the "Star Elders" or "Invisible Council", understood this natural power to create their reality. Their sacred calendars mapped the natural laws of the universe. Now it is our turn to come to this understanding. It is time for us to walk as the Star Elders did so many years ago. The time has come for us to change the world.

The more humanity begins to live In Lak'ech Ala K'in, the less we will think in terms of our separateness. There can be no competition, jealousy or envy between us, because we are pieces of each other. We can share and help each other with our connections, ideas and resources without fear that there will not be enough to go around. When we live the reality of unity, abundance and wholeness, there will be unity, abundance and wholeness! The more of us that participate in the creation of a better world, the quicker it will arrive. We will have peace, love, harmony and unity, and will finally have arrived home.

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