by John E. Mack, M.D. The majority of “abductees” report some degree of trauma in connection with their experiences. The intrusive events themselves may be terrifying. Experiencers feel afraid to talk about what they have undergone lest they be ridiculed and further isolated. The experiences shock their ideas of reality. Finally, they feel helpless to […]
Continue ReadingHuman Transformation and Alien Encounters
The Moral Truth is Out There
by Theodore Roszak By definition, folklore is that which cannot be destroyed by mere facts. So it is unlikely that the Air Force’s latest effort to convince UFO enthusiasts that aliens did not crash at Roswell, NM, in 1947 will have any effect beyond feeding the voracious paranoia that now surrounds the story. As the […]
Continue ReadingFaces of the Visitors: Stranger Than Fiction
by Michael Lindemann Given the incredible diversity of reported human experiences with alleged [alien] visitors, is it possible to say who or what we are dealing with? Perhaps the closest we can get to the truth is an idea that confounds and infuriates literalists everywhere: the nature of the visitors is in the eye of […]
Continue ReadingScience Humbled
by Reverend Jeffrey L. Brown and Janis A. Pryor The Reverend Jeffrey Brown is pastor of the Union Baptist Church, Central Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Janis A. Pryor is an author who lives in Cambridge. Perhaps the most significant consequence of John Mack’s work with abductees (those who believe they have had an encounter or encounters […]
Continue ReadingIntegrating Extraordinary Experiences
by Roberta L. Colasanti, LICSW At a mutidisciplinary meeting of academicians convened by the Center’s Program for Extraordinary Experience Research (PEER) in April 1999 at the Harvard Divinity School, PEER’s former clinical director Roberta Colasanti, LICSW, spoke about the people who seek clinical assistance in dealing with life-long alien encounter experiences. This transcript is excerpted […]
Continue ReadingAlien Abduction? Reductionists Call It Sleep Paralysis
Roberta Colasanti, LICSW Clinical Director, PEER The recent article by Nicholas D. Kristof[1] suggesting that science implicates sleep paralysis as the main reason for reports of alien abductions demonstrates how threatening data, like reports of alien abduction or contact, can only be tolerated by fitting them into a reductionistic worldview. The fact that the only […]
Continue ReadingContact Experience and Ancient Traditions
by Veronica Goodchild, Ph.D. One of the difficulties of the alien encounter experience is trying to convey to others the kind of “place” or “landscape” of these anomalous visitations. Because in the West we are so used to restricting our experience within an empirical scientific worldview, things either happen in a world outside, or we […]
Continue ReadingWhat do Alien Abduction and Psychedelic Experiences have in Common? Let Dr. John E. Mack’s Work Explain
The story of the Harvard psychiatrist who wanted to believe – and ended up introducing the entire culture to the possibility of transpersonal experiences. This article is available online at Psychedelics Today (external link). This is independently written; the author has no affiliation with JEMI. Michelle Janikian is a journalist and the author of Your […]
Continue ReadingAlien Thinking
by Angela Hind, Pier Productions 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 […]
Continue ReadingReview of David Grinspoon’s Lonely Planets: The Natural Philosophy of Alien Life
by John E. Mack (review), David Grinspoon (excerpt) Review follows a publisher-authorized excerpt. Excerpt from Lonely Planets by David Grinspoon, Ph.D. Spirits from the Vasty Deep We have all felt this impulse in our childhood as our ancestors did before us, when they conjured goblins and spirits from the vasty void, and if our energy […]
Continue ReadingThe Aliens are Always with Us
by Bryan Appleyard 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 John Mack, professor of psychiatry at Harvard, died after being hit by a car in north London last week. I learnt […]
Continue ReadingJohn Mack’s Transpersonal Journey Continues
By Bill Chalker 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 […]
Continue ReadingDr. Mack Responds to Psychology Today Article
By John E. Mack, M.D. 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.” […]
Continue ReadingDismissing Extraordinary Experiences
A rebuttal to a commentary by skeptic Joe Nickell by John E. Mack, M.D. with Will Bueché Nickell’s critique dismisses extraordinary experiences a priori. Having codified experiences that transcend our material reality (from “psychic abilities” to “religious visions”) as examples of fantasy, it is thereafter a simple matter of defining anyone who has such experiences […]
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