Vallee: Orthoteny Crisis (1963)

[ChrisPerridas]

Dr Wu, I have been reading through Jacques vallee's bio,
Forbidden Science: Journals 1957-1969 - Jacques Vallee - Google Books

And I read a lot of interesting things so far. He and Hynek met and struck it off, but Mrs. Hynek seemed to be very against UFOs. They fought. (17 Nov 1963).

He seemed to have encountered a crisis when he discovered that Aime Michel's theory of othoteny of landings and sightings was random. He accepted the evidence, but not the implication that sightings were randomly spaced among the reporting population. (28 Nov 1963).

All this during the Kennedy assassination, and babies being born. That's quite a lot going on.

Any thoughts on this?

[dr wu23]

Originally Posted by ChrisPerridas

Dr Wu, I have been reading through Jacques vallee's bio,
Forbidden Science: Journals 1957-1969 - Jacques Vallee - Google Books

And I read a lot of interesting things so far. He and Hynek met and struck it off, but Mrs. Hynek seemed to be very against UFOs. They fought. (17 Nov 1963).

He seemed to have encountered a crisis when he discovered that Aime Michel's theory of othoteny of landings and sightings was random. He accepted the evidence, but not the implication that sightings were randomly spaced among the reporting population. (28 Nov 1963).

All this during the Kennedy assassination, and babies being born. That's quite a lot going on.

Any thoughts on this?

Thoughts on Hynek's wife, orthoteny, babies, or Kennedy...?

It's been a while since I read Forbidden Science and I don't recall all the stories or the orthoteny disagreement , but I recall Aime Michelle's 'straightline' theory and read about it a long time ago.
I thought Michelle claimed they were not randomly placed and tended to follow straight lines? He based this on sightings in France especially in the mid 50's by plotting out the locations which fell close to a linear path.
Maybe I'm getting this mixed up with another idea?

[ChrisPerridas]

Vallee's computer program blew the theory to pieces, apparently.

He immediately begins to discuss all manners of esoterica in the days and weeks to follow. I found that fascinating, this immediate divergence once this central theory imploded.

The whole book is online at the link I gave.

[ChrisPerridas]

Dr Wu, I got through page 23 of Revelations. Just so you are with me,

Scenarios
Over the last ten years the UFO enigma has become an important theme in the development of new belief systems. ... There is a network of such stories, and it feeds on itself to create a disturbing tapestry – not the bright tapestry of the artist, but the kind of pattern an army of spiders could weave, if left alone in an underground cave.

Note the use of "belief" here, and Vallee's shock of Patton's former aide seeing not one but several UFOs, probably none of them real. You've read the book, I haven't. But if you wanted to comment on it up to here, I'd like your view. Or any one's.

If you don't have your copy handy:

Jacques Vallee - Revelations

[ChrisPerridas]

Or any thoughts about Vallee's 7 pitfalls? I see most of these violated daily here on the forum. I abridged them. (page 43 ff. of Revelations).

Seven Pitfalls

Pitfall One: The Transitivity of Strangeness
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). When challenged the person makes a second very strange statement (B), but proves (B). Then, the implication is that (A) is also correct.

Pitfall Two: The Ratchet Effect
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). Through investigation, (A) is disproved, but like a mysterious infection, the listener never returns to an original viewpoint.

Pitfall Three: Spurious Data Sequencing
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). The statement is incorrect, but it is so amazingly interesting, that you never cut that person off as a crank. The higher in ufology circles, the more likely the investigator is to continue unique, but bizarre relationships.

Pitfall Four: The Lure of The Physical
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). The lack of real data makes experienced but frustrated ufologists most likely to believe and disseminate unusual, and spurious data (A).

Pitfall Five: The Coconut Fallacy
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). That statement is held at arms length so that scientific examination is impossible, but you can only observe from a distance. This perpetuates the statement forever, with no possibility of determining it as true.

Pitfall Six: Mystery Merging
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). They add (B). The items occur in close time and space proximity, so they merge them into a single mystery. This is also known as matrixing. There is no reason to believe they are connected, but the illusion persists.

Pitfall Seven: The Magnification of Secrecy
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). If it is claimed to be a secret, or alleged to be suppressed by some authority, the statement becomes magnified in importance.

To this, we can add the media factor. If the statement (A) is on television, on the internet, in a book, it is perceived as more factual.

[dr wu23]

Originally Posted by ChrisPerridas

Vallee's computer program blew the theory to pieces, apparently.

He immediately begins to discuss all manners of esoterica in the days and weeks to follow. I found that fascinating, this immediate divergence once this central theory imploded.

The whole book is online at the link I gave.

I own a copy....now and then I refer back to his books.

[dr wu23]

Originally Posted by ChrisPerridas

Dr Wu, I got through page 23 of Revelations. Just so you are with me,

Scenarios
Over the last ten years the UFO enigma has become an important theme in the development of new belief systems. ... There is a network of such stories, and it feeds on itself to create a disturbing tapestry – not the bright tapestry of the artist, but the kind of pattern an army of spiders could weave, if left alone in an underground cave.

Note the use of "belief" here, and Vallee's shock of Patton's former aide seeing not one but several UFOs, probably none of them real. You've read the book, I haven't. But if you wanted to comment on it up to here, I'd like your view. Or any one's.

If you don't have your copy handy:

Jacques Vallee - Revelations

I've read it several times, nothing to really say right now ,but I'll chime in when it strikes something I think relevant.

[Jurgen]

Originally Posted by dr wu23

¿I own a copy....now and then I refer back to his books.¿

There really should be a sarcasm icon available... you know, like a question mark or an exclamation mark. I propose the up side down question mark "¿"

¿"Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us."¿

[dr wu23]

Originally Posted by ChrisPerridas

Or any thoughts about Vallee's 7 pitfalls? I see most of these violated daily here on the forum. I abridged them. (page 43 ff. of Revelations).

Seven Pitfalls

Pitfall One: The Transitivity of Strangeness
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). When challenged the person makes a second very strange statement (B), but proves (B). Then, the implication is that (A) is also correct.

Pitfall Two: The Ratchet Effect
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). Through investigation, (A) is disproved, but like a mysterious infection, the listener never returns to an original viewpoint.

Pitfall Three: Spurious Data Sequencing
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). The statement is incorrect, but it is so amazingly interesting, that you never cut that person off as a crank. The higher in ufology circles, the more likely the investigator is to continue unique, but bizarre relationships.

Pitfall Four: The Lure of The Physical
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). The lack of real data makes experienced but frustrated ufologists most likely to believe and disseminate unusual, and spurious data (A).

Pitfall Five: The Coconut Fallacy
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). That statement is held at arms length so that scientific examination is impossible, but you can only observe from a distance. This perpetuates the statement forever, with no possibility of determining it as true.

Pitfall Six: Mystery Merging
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). They add (B). The items occur in close time and space proximity, so they merge them into a single mystery. This is also known as matrixing. There is no reason to believe they are connected, but the illusion persists.

Pitfall Seven: The Magnification of Secrecy
Someone makes an extremely strange statement (A). If it is claimed to be a secret, or alleged to be suppressed by some authority, the statement becomes magnified in importance.

To this, we can add the media factor. If the statement (A) is on television, on the internet, in a book, it is perceived as more factual.

I don't recall those but I do recall his 5 arguments against the ETH in the appendix. The pitfalls sound valid to me and probably are relevant to the paranormal in general and not just ufos.

[dr wu23]

Originally Posted by Jurgen

There really should be a sarcasm icon available... you know, like a question mark or an exclamation mark. I propose the up side down question mark "¿"

¿"Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us."¿

I was not being sarcastic there...not sure what you mean.
There are a lot of very good ufo books but imho Vallee's are a must read for anyone who wants to see the whole picture.