Episode 411 – Mysterious Universe

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On this week’s episode we discuss the recent mainstream media attention on the UFO phenomenon which has come about mainly via Leslie Kean’s new book, and the common misconceptions still surrounding the topic.

We again turn to Jason Offutt for a brand new Black Eyed Kid account in Ohio, take a look at new Crop Circles in the UK, and investigate another tale of communication with Sasquatch.

Show notes and music after the jump.

Leslie Kean On The Colbert Report

Chicago Tribune Revives the O’Hare UFO Incident

Michio Kaku Comments on UFOs

Stories in Pictures: Where are all the UFO Photos?

Where Are All the UFO Photos? (Here let me google that for you Mr. Corn)

The Best UFO Pictures Ever Taken (Oh, there you go. That wasn’t so hard was it?)

Britain goes crop circle crazy

PLANT ABNORMALITIES INDICATE PLASMA DISCHARGE

Copenhagen Suborbitals prepare to launch first private rocket, astronaut into space

Black-Eyed Kids in Ohio

The gift of the sasquatch – part one / part two

China’s nine-day traffic jam stretches 100km

Plus Content

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UFOs in the 1950s: The Caribbean Crisis

Death that stalks the sleepwalker

10 Unbelievable Sleepwalking Stories

TCI – SP- 4 – Influences – Lon Strickler

The Phantom Barber of Pascagoula

This entry was posted by Benjamin Grundy on Friday, August 27th, 2010 at 9:39 am and is filed under Podcasts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Jacob

Hey guys,

Starting in minute 22:49, do you guys accidentally have the story repeat at 23:27? Or are my ears deceiving me? Thanks for the show!
http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/QQ4O3PKE2CNFXV66MZEFGQ5C2M Leaf

Thanks again guys for another entertaining show. Ive been listening for years.
I think you guys could inject a little more critical thinking and skepticism in the commentary instead of giving creedence to so much of what’s obviously specious, but I do enjoy it. The crop circles should be put to rest. They’re human made, that’s well known and documented. Amazing, but human made.
I strongly encourage you and all interested listeners to check out the book Mirage Men .It’s a level headed and clear look at UFO mythology and culture and digs up some amazing information about the origins of the phenomenon. I doubt you’ll think of UFOs the same way again. Thanks again for the show.
http://mysteriousuniverse.org Benjamin Grundy

Thanks for that. We missed an edit there! I’ll upload a fix now
Spookchild

I really liked the story about the Sasquatch holding the baby raccoon in front of the woman’s game camera. That really gave me a chuckle. But without pics this story is just that: a good story.

Great episode, guys!
//Juuro

Re: Microwave weapons and crop circles. When the microwave radiation turns the nodes of the stem of the grass to mush, what is the mechanism that determines the direction that the stalks will fall? The time it takes for the grass cells to be boiled soft will not give time for a dust-devil or other thermal air current to have macroscopic effect.

Re: Spiritual sasquatch. I seem to recall having read sometime in the 1970 about the Himalayan yeti being in communication with the lamaseries and other spiritual practitioners in the region. In your reports on spiritual sasquatch, have you mentioned the yeti and eastern spiritualities?
Bel1760

Loved the bit about sleepwalking. I just found the empty pag of potato chips that I put in the freezer. Last week I put the canister of dry creamer in the fridge, put the milk in the cabinet (it’s ruined), and put vasolene all over my freezer mugs. Yes I take sleeping pills and my partner is terrified of me. LOL At his urging, I have lowered my dose.
http://www.facebook.com/danielle.meierhenry Danielle Meierhenry

The Phantom Barber didn’t strike me as paranormal in the least. I agree with Ben’s assertion that it was likely a fetishist. Also, the one woman who remembered the smell was likely due to the attacker using ether, chloroform, or some other chemical to knock her into unconsciousness so he could get the teeth. When you awake from those substances you do often feel very ill.

I wonder if that story inspired the X-Files episode called “Irresistible” where a guy has a fetish for hair and nails. He usually gets them off dead bodies, either digging them up, or from funeral homes. His behavior escalates as he begins to like getting his trophies from living women, actually killing them before harvesting his trophies.

In any case, it’s been interesting listening to Aaron’s change from a skeptic to a believer. Though not everything is a demon, or possession, or alien abduction. This story sounded extremely straight-forward to me. Seeing posssesion or abduction in the tale seemed a very far stretch. But it was still a great story, so I thank you for sharing it.
Diplomatic

Hi Guys,
Ben I loved your impression of Aaron at the beginning of 411. With his ‘new gear!’

I listened to it a couple of times. Thought it was hilarious!

By the way Aaron there is absolutely no difference whatsoever mate. Truthfully…

Great episode guys.

In response to Leaf’s comments below about Crop Circles. Sorry but I couldn’t disagree with you more. A number of country yokels in rural England claim to have created the crop circles, but the truth is, has any of them actually ever gone out and been filmed creating one of these extraordinary designs? I don’t believe so. I’ve seen some footage of one guy demonstrating the planks and string method but the guy made a simple circle. And the nodes weren’t popped and exposed to extreme temperature. We need a TV Production company to front some money and offer these people a fee to create something as spectacular as what we have seen on film. Would make a great documentary. I would love to see them try, and afterwards the wheat needs to be analysed to check the nodes.

I am not of the opinion that this is caused by Spacecraft landing, but I think that weather phenomenon, advanced weapons, and other theories should be given credence.

Steve.
Anonymous

Thanks for your great comment Steve Thanks for the support!
kim

from the other two ‘raptors you didn’t even know were there. Because Velociraptor’s a pack hunter, you see, he uses coordinated attack patterns and he is out in force today. And he slashes at you with this… a six-inch retractable claw, like a razor, on the the middle toe. He doesn’t bother to bite your jugular like a lion, say… no no. He slashes at you here… or here… or maybe across the belly, spilling your intestines. The point is… you are alive when they start to eat you. So you know… try to show a little respect.”

It gives me the feeling that either Elder Sasquatch watched Jurassic Park, which is unlikely, or that the interpreter fellow introduced these lines. Perhaps as a hoax. Or, perhaps this is how his mind interpreted the communication, framing it into something that would be familiar to him.

It could be — as you commented about ‘cave man speech’ — that his mind interpreted whatever thoughts and feelings he received as ‘cave man speech’ for a similar framing reason. Familiarity; something within his expectations and experience.

Anyways I’m starting to become a fan of your show after a friend sent me an episode a few weeks back! Thanks for producing it — this particular line just struck me as odd, so I wanted to comment.
http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/QQ4O3PKE2CNFXV66MZEFGQ5C2M Leaf

Diplomatic,
About the crop circles… I understand your point but, and Im not trying to be contrary or bust any bubbles. But take a minute to apply the logical idea of Occam’s Razor:
The people creating crop circles are not country yokels but smart creative tech- savvy artists. I agree , a drunk with a board couldn’t produce one, but with a computer program to map out the diagram and some flattened tools , it can be done quickly in the middle of the night. And it is. That’s is how it’s done, Ive known people who do it. It’s no secret , there’s even a book . The Field Guide: The Art, History & Philosophy of Crop Circle Making , which explains how it’s done. The creators enjoy playing around with the mystery but they have admitted to it . Furthermore, I dont think there’s anything unusual that happens to the nodes or, I’ve never seen any proof of that. But now the myth has become larger than the truth. That’s the strange thing about humans, they’ll choose almost every possible explanation except the simplest to describe it, same with UFOs. To say that a UFO is not from Earth is a huge leap, and the chances of that being true are almost zero, right? After all ,we ( humans) can and do make these crafts so why wouldn’t they be ours?
Thurstan Johnston

Black eyed kids. Thinking about it, could some of this be attributed to people on drugs like Ecstasy or something? Your pupils dilate big time and could be mistaken for having black eyes.
Also I wonder if there are creative kids out there thinking “how can we freak someone out? I know, lets all get black contact lenses and scare people!”
http://www.facebook.com/danielle.meierhenry Danielle Meierhenry

I’ve been to many a rave and done many a drug in my youth, and no matter how dialated someone’s eyes have been it’s never seemed “freaky”. You’ll never have that demon-eye effect (like you can see on TV in and movies when they use the black-out contact lenses) when drug-dialated eyes.

And in the Black-Eyed Kids and People account, is it *just* the colored area of the eye that is black, or is it the entire eye? I always pictured it with the whole eye being black. Because THAT would be scary.
Doctornamtab

Dude. Aaron. You’re wearing Tom Cruise’s braces?

Did you wash them first?

Mysterious Universe