Cryptoterrestrials in the (WHA??) news!

I came across BIG news to me.

It requires a bit of set up, though.

Anyone who knows me knows I’ve spent far too much time researching “the weird.” Not so much recently for various reasons, but it still captivates me, mostly in terms of cultural phenomena and collaborative narrative constructs. Fifteen years ago in my “travels,” I came across the name Mac Tonnies and his blog, Posthuman Blues. I dove deep into his posts, amazed at how much we had in common. He’s an English grad, a writer, a science fiction devotee, a Fortean, and a futurist! And he likes The Cure and The Smiths!

He also, quite sadly, was dead about a year before I knew of him. We would never converse. Just one of those strange twists of fate.

Last Friday though, I saw a post that pretty much rocked my world. Scholars from Harvard University and Montana Technical University published a paper putting forward the concept of “cryptoterrestrials.” As congressional hearings and high profile stories in outlets such as 60 Minutes have kept UFO (or UAP if you prefer) sightings in the zeitgeist, logical questions have once more circulated as to what the things are, and if they are indeed vehicles, do they have pilots? The cryptoterrestrials hypothesis posits that the occupants of the craft are not aliens from another planet, but perhaps beings from right here on Earth that fall into one of the following categories:

-The remains of an ancient, but technologically advanced, civilization.

-A breakaway civilization that branched off from humanity somewhere in the evolutionary process.

-Really bizarre, quasi-mystical entities more akin to angels than aliens.

In the first two cases, these beings would be living underground beneath remote sierras, or on the ocean floor (a place about which we know precious little).

Critically, the academic paper cites Mac Tonnies and his posthumously published book, Cryptoterrestrials. As he termed it, the book is “a meditation on indigenous humanoids and aliens among us.” The “nuts and bolts, spaceships from other planets” explanation really didn’t sit well with him, so Mac began searching for alternative approaches for those few bizarre cases that still defy easy explanation. As one might imagine, Cryptoterrestrials was an obscure book, published by a small publisher. Other than Amazon, you might have found a couple copies of it in the paranormal section of Barnes & Noble. But that slim volume was there first in many ways, even to the point of being cited in an academic paper making major news.

A few important caveats:

-The authors of the published paper acknowledged the lack of any conclusive evidence for cryptoterrestrials at this time. Instead, they tender their hypothesis in hopes of “consideration in a spirit of epistemic humility and openness.”

-Even Mac stood on the shoulders of giants. John Keel, Jacques Vallee, and Ivan T. Sanderson all wrote their own speculations along similar lines. That’s how research is done. One person builds on another’s work. Mac added to and expanded on the idea considerably.

-Don’t call me a “believer in cryptoterrestrials.” I’m not. We clear? Even Mac wasn’t sold on the idea and considered it a thought experiment. Like most skeptics, I see no evidence…yet. I confess the idea is tantalizing, but that’s not the point. That's not what has me excited. 

Mac was a super smart guy and a great writer. This current turn of events demonstrates that you never know how something someone has done might be influential later on, even long after they are gone.

I cannot help but feel an odd stirring of hope at that prospect. So…

Yes! Mac lives!

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