Russian
BBC News, June 8, 2005
Not many scientists are prepared to take tales of alien abduction seriously, but John Mack, a Harvard professor who was killed in a road accident in north London last year, did. Ten years on from a row which nearly lost him his job, hundreds of people who claim they were abducted still revere him.
Review follows a publisher-authorized excerpt.
A Harvard professor killed in London last week had been vilified for his belief in the ‘third realm’. His theories may not be as mad as some think says Bryan Appleyard
Like all of us I found the news of John Mack’s untimely passing very saddening.
While some of us might not have agreed with some of the directions John was taking the subject in, I think the field has been enriched by his involvement. When he was in Australia I supported his research into indigenous aboriginal abduction & UFO experiences — an area we both had a strong interest in, particularly its shamanic dimensions. On the hurdles he often encountered, particularly from mainstream academia, he once told me what he felt. Maybe his response was coloured by spending too much time in Australia, but clearly he enjoyed his time down down under. His response: “Fuck ‘em”. I smiled and wished him well. He was always a courageous and wonderful researcher. Full speed John on the rest of your transpersonal journey.
How do you know what you believe you know?
Does your knowing come from what you read? From what your parents told you? From what you were taught in schools? From experiences in sports and physical activity? From experiences in art? From experiences with a spirit world?
Dear Friends/List,
I cannot comment directly on what was said in the Psychology Today article, for, like many people in this and related fields, the distortions of positions and outright misquoting is so rampant in most mainstream articles on these subjects that it is impossible to “set the record straight.” It may be unwise to give interviews at all, but there is always the hope that something useful may get across — the reporters always assure you of their openness (they may be sometimes; editors and executives is another matter). There is also the damned-if-you-do damned-if-you-don’t problem: if you give an interview you’re likely to get distorted or boxed by a twisting context; if you don’t they sometimes get downright nasty.
Oberlin Alumni Magazine, Fall 2002
Vol. 98, No. 2
If someone out there is trying to warn us, shouldn’t we make an attempt to listen?
ABSTRACT — The scientific method has been highly successful in giving us reliable ways of knowing about the material world as we know it. But we have yet to develop methodologies that are as reliable with respect to matters that are not clearly in the objective or the subjective realms but seem to partake of both. In this paper I will consider the elements of an expanded epistemology which might help to legitimize experiences that are giving us vital information about the cosmos but which cannot be substantiated by the ways of knowing now considered reliable in Western culture.
Are we ready to admit this lesson of the Rio+5 and Kyoto environmental meetings: that we must finally give up hoping for environmental wisdom and political will from political leaders and their conferences? Perhaps we need to look elsewhere, to reconsider those visionary, religious traditions that would transform us. Certainly, by now there is a growing scientific consensus to help us along: if we value life on Earth, we must change our lives.
This is the long-form version of the essay, The Environmental Message of the Aliens
Harvard psychiatrist and Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer John E. Mack, M.D., spoke at the Seven Stars book store in his hometown of Cambridge, Massachusetts, earlier this spring (March 2000). Dr. Mack talked about his new book, Passport to the Cosmos, and shared where his journey has taken him in his understanding of the relationship between alien encounters and human transformation.
What do people really want when they think about UFOs?
According to John Mack’s newest book Passport to the Cosmos, the first thing they want is for their experiences to stop. Only after they realize they have no power to stop the experience do they begin to accept a process that is informative and transformative — a process that propels them out of their narcissistic concerns and towards active involvement with environmental values, the survival of humanity and an exploration of spiritually-based consciousness. The Harvard psychiatrist also includes three other perspectives of contact with the “Star People.” These perspectives include those of a Native-American healer, a South African shaman, and an indiginous anthropologist from South America. The same themes continue to resonate through all perspectives.