Philosopher Bernardo Kastrup presents new high quality UAP/UFO theory

Noted philosopher Bernardo Kastrup has surprisingly entered into the debate about the nature of the UAP or UFO phenomenon. He has now presented in his website a very interesting, knowledgeable and high quality essay on his current hypothesis for this, at https://www.bernardokastrup.com/2024/01/...at-is.html . Like his philosophical/metaphysical positions, it deserves extended consideration.

He provisionally considers the hidden psych-ops program theory, and ultimately rejects it.
He begins,

"I submit to you that the following tentative premises are justifiable:

...firstly, there is an engineered technology in our skies and oceans that is not human. The counterargument to this is, of course, that UAPs may be top-secret but very human military devices, often called ‘black technology.’ Yet, this seems to contradict much of what has been disclosed since 2017.
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Secondly, if there is non-human technology in our skies and oceans, then there must be Non-Human Intelligences (NHIs) active on our planet, engineering and controlling the UAPs. This does not imply that the NHIs are extra-terrestrial; it means simply that they aren’t human.
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....the data, if taken seriously, does not seem to allow for prosaic alternatives. So whatever hypotheses we entertain, they will per force stretch our credulity. Indeed, to insist on prosaic explanations we must disregard the data."

His suggested hypothesis goes the way of Jacques Vallee's work:

"Two key conclusions from Dr. Vallée’s work are particularly pertinent to our challenge here. The first is that, based on countless witness reports, the phenomenon does not seem to make any distinction between physical and psychological effects; it produces both, as if they were mere facets of one and the same causative mechanisms. The boundaries we draw between the mental and the physical don’t seem to be observed by the phenomenon, which transits casually back and forth across the dividing line. Dr. Vallée acknowledges the undeniable physical aspect of the phenomenon—it can be filmed, tracked by radar and other sensors, emits measurable energy, often leaves physical footprints and vestiges behind, etc.—but adds that at least part of what the witnesses experience is “staged”: the UAP sometimes evokes archetypal, symbolic imagery directly in the witness’ mind to convey a feeling-laden metaphorical message, which transcends the objectively measurable characteristics of the phenomenon.
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The second pertinent conclusion from Dr. Vallée’s work is that the pattern of behaviour of UAPs is not consistent with the extra-terrestrial hypothesis (see chapter 9 of his book, Dimensions). Dr. Vallée estimated that, in a period of just twenty years, there have been about three million UAP landings. This is not consistent with visitations by beings from another planet for the purposes of surveying the Earth or researching its inhabitants (orders of magnitude less visits would have sufficed for these purposes); instead, the UAPs’ behaviour is precisely what one would expect if they were from here—and were simply going about their business."

Kastrup then divides the overall phenomenon into two basic classes or categories, "nuts and bolts", and "high strangeness".

"One clearly discernible class of observations, which I shall henceforth refer to as ‘nuts-and-bolts’ UAPs, entails physical craft that can not only consistently be seen, filmed, and tracked by radar, but also—if we are to believe Mr. Grusch’s informants and other sources in a position to plausibly know—stored in hangars for decades, drilled into, analysed under a scanning electron microscope, etc. The bodies of their occupants can also—again, if we are to believe the sources—be kept in freezers and harvested for biochemical analysis.
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Unlike the above, another class of observations entails encounters in one’s bedroom, at school, during one’s commute back from work, and other ordinary, random situations unrelated to military activity. These are the so-called ‘high strangeness’ events, encompassing the ‘alien contactee’ and ‘alien abduction’ cases. The craft and beings observed don’t have a consistent physical aspect but are, instead, elusive, appearing and disappearing, taking on an absurd variety of incongruous forms and behaviours. They leave either none or scarce, ambiguous physical traces....I am not dismissive of this ‘high strangeness’ class of observations."

He then furnishes a detailed discussion of the "nuts and bolts" type of cases:

Kastrup adopts the so-called "Silurian Hypothesis" in explanation, that rather than the "nuts and bolts" craft being extraterrestrials, a geologically ancient non-human civilization developed on our planet in our very distant past hundreds of millions of years ago, and the manufacturers and pilots of the "nuts and bolts" craft are the greatly evolved remnants of that civilization, persisting underground or underwater or elsewhere in the solar system ever since. Such beings would have developed extremely advanced technology (explaining the existence of and interactions with "nuts and bolts" UAPs), plus other powerful mental (apparently paranormal) abilities (explaining the mind-altering "high strangeness" features of various cases).

He says,

"Depending on the surviving level of their technology, they could have made a home for themselves underwater or underground. A few generations of (directed) adaptation—genetic and cultural—to such an environment would render the planet’s surface perhaps as alien and inhospitable to them as the Mariana Trench is to us. They would be okay with allowing the monkeys to run amok on top of the roof (provided that the monkeys don’t start a thermonuclear war and compromise the entire house), but would rather stay safely indoors."

Kastrup then speculates on the possible motivations of these distantly related by evolution creatures:

"In conclusion, I submit the hypothesis that, when UAPs manipulate our perceptions during an encounter, they are, in fact, attempting to communicate in the only way they can. Analogously, if you are hiking in a remote trail and come across a wild bear - another terrestrial species with a cognitive structure different from ours, which we encounter by chance as they go about their business in their own habitat - the bear, too, will communicate with you in the only way it can: through meaning-evoking body posture and sounds; and you will even understand it. The difference is that UAPs are better, more nuanced and sophisticated at the task."

His final summary conclusion:

"The hypothesis I put forward is that, if the ‘nuts-and-bolts’ UAP phenomenon and the Non-Human Intelligence(s) behind it are real, they are unlikely to be extra-terrestrial. Instead, they may consist of remnants of industrial, technological NHIs evolved on Earth up to 350 million years ago. We cannot find conspicuous archaeological or geological footprints of such civilizations because, according to the so-called ‘Silurian Hypothesis,’ not only weather erosion, but also the regular recycling of the Earth’s crust through plate tectonics, erase them."

I think his reasoning is sound for the most part, except for his suggested likelihood that such beings could have persisted so very long in geological history (and the unlikelihood that there would be fossil remains of this civilization), and I would disagree that all of the "nuts and bolts" cases are really from here.

Sadly he takes Grusch seriously which I suspect will end up hurting UFO/UAP discussions more than he realizes.

One clearly discernible class of observations, which I shall henceforth refer to as ‘nuts-and-bolts’ UAPs, entails physical craft that can not only consistently be seen, filmed, and tracked by radar, but also—if we are to believe Mr. Grusch’s informants and other sources in a position to plausibly know—stored in hangars for decades, drilled into, analysed under a scanning electron microscope, etc. The bodies of their occupants can also—again, if we are to believe the sources—be kept in freezers and harvested for biochemical analysis.

I wouldn't bother taking this seriously without more evidence, part of why I don't give much weight to nuts & bolts claims.

But he cleverly avoids the pitfall with interstellar nuts & bolts aliens I have pointed out a couple of times.

I'm not really a follower of UAP phenomena but I find the Kastrup speculations interesting for a couple of reasons. Anyone who has followed my posts over the years will know that I often bring up the Seth Material. That's because I often remember something in that material either pertinent or even prophetic about the subject being discussed. In this case, I remember Seth talking about a pre-human civilization who were technologically more advanced than ourselves yet not in an industrialised way. They were mostly subterranean.

Secondly, Kastrup might be pricking the mainstream arrogance bubble by lending weight to hypotheses of both Vallee and Hancock and their fellow alternative confederates. All-in-all, Bernardo seems to delight in challenging the consensus - good luck to him.

Naturalizing without Demythologizing the UFO: A Textual Proposal Supporting Kastrup's Ultraterrestrial Hypothesis

James Madden

In a recent article, “UAPs and Non-Human Intelligence: What is the Most Reasonable Scenario,” Bernardo Kastrup motivates an explanatory hypothesis for the UAP phenomenon. Kastrup has developed such a theory in other writings, but this iteration of his views on the UAP is particularly interesting because it takes into account the recent tantalizing developments in the available evidence (or at least the testimony avowing that there is such evidence,) while introducing a novel suggestion as to how we should frame the question of the UAP.1 In what follows, I will give an account of Kastrup’s position and how it makes a novel contribution to the standard taxonomy of positions in ufology, and then make a suggestion of how an under-appreciated method of argumentation taken from philosophy of religion might render his hypothesis far more probable than it may appear at first blush. This treatment of Kastrup’s position will also suggest an integral, though open-ended, role for the humanities and social sciences in our confrontation with the UAP phenomenon.

Let's begin by distinguishing two basic and common strategies for explaining UAP. On the one hand, there are what I call onto-techno theories of UAPs. These accounts explain the UAP phenomenon in terms of technology (however remote from our expectations of what is mechanically possible) wielded by some sort of nonhuman intelligent entity (organic or AI), which exists in a straightforwardly physical way (however remote from our expectations for physical beings). Onto-techno theories have come in a number of varieties...

On the other hand, we have cosmic consciousness theories. Those who proffer such theories do not take UAPs or the seemingly related abduction phenomenon so much as the intervention of flesh and blood entities, but instead as a planetary-wide spiritual process that is altering human consciousness in order to avoid self-induced ecological catastrophe...

Kastrup seems to think as much. In his most recent essay on the topic, he emphasizes that “I do not think that the ‘high strangeness’ phenomenon is the same as the ‘nuts-and-bolts’ UAPs,” while he cautions that conflating “the two . . . may make it impossible to account for either, as no one account will be consistent with the sometimes mutually contradictory characteristics of both.”13 In other words, Kastrup, at least at this point in the inquiry, has despaired of putting the nuts-and-bolts data and the high strangeness data into a synoptic whole. In fact, our attempts at such a synthesis only make matters worse, because they tempt us to distort these distinct types of data in order to make them fit together. It may be the the case that the square peg simply will not fit into the round hole, so we should settle for separate accounts rather than reshaping the puzzle pieces to conform to our desire for a nice and neat theoretical story.

Bernardo Kastrup has a background at CERN and cannot ignore the evidence that faster-than-light travel is impossible. Therefore, any UAP/UFO theory he proposes is bound to comply with known physics.

I still don’t find it plausible that the remains of an ancient civilization could remain completely hidden without revealing themselves in some detectable way, such as through the electromagnetic spectrum. I wish he hadn’t contributed to this discussion, as I’m generally a big fan of his.

Bernardo Kastrup has a background at CERN and cannot ignore the evidence that faster-than-light travel is impossible. Therefore, any UAP/UFO theory he proposes is bound to comply with known physics.

I still don’t find it plausible that the remains of an ancient civilization could remain completely hidden without revealing themselves in some detectable way, such as through the electromagnetic spectrum. I wish he hadn’t contributed to this discussion, as I’m generally a big fan of his.

Kastrup assumes that extraterrestrial "nuts and bolts" UFO vehicles and alien beings from other planetary systems in the Galaxy or the Universe are absolutely ruled out due to the laws of physics limiting space travel to far sublight speeds, ruling out the extraterrestrial hypothesis and leaving whatever ideas are left over as maybe plausible alternate hypotheses. 

I think Kastrup's alternate theory positing differently evolved geologically ancient Earthly intelligent beings that over the ages have migrated to somewhere on the Earth or in the solar system unobserved by us to date has at least two serious flaws - the first is that such a far-prehistoric civilization, in order to develop scientifically and technologically, would have inevitably used up by mining and drilling a significant portion of the various metals and oil and coal inevitably required by the earlier stages of their technological evolution and development, and today despite much geological subduction and other forces in the Earth since then there should still be clear traces of this in the discovery of many geologically-ancient remains of super-ancient mines and somehow already depleted metal deposits and oilfields and coal formations, and also at least some traces of the remains of their physical civilization, their cities, discarded technological detritus like virtually indestructible ceramic toilet bowls, etc. Notheing like this has every been discovered.

The second flaw is that there is no trace in the fossil record of any large-brained bipedal tool-manipulative and capable species of early predator dinosaur or whatever, in the fossil record. Any large population of such beings would have left some sort of record in the form of fossils. 
 
I think that this leaves little but some other rather scientifically untenable basic hypotheses or far-out ideas - that these beings are "Ultraterrestrials" from somewhere far stranger, that they are from another parallel Universe, or from very far forward in the future via some sort of time travel, or from some other dimension of existence. They then must still be alien, but far stranger than extraterrestial intelligences.

Not sure there have to electromagnetic traces, and not sure there would be any traces over millions of years [of a past land based civ].

However, the haphazard/chaotic/Weird aspects of the UAP/UFO phenomenon make me highly doubt technologically superior aliens are trying to talk to us using such events as their means.

Also if we did share this world with a technologically advanced species I am guessing they would have intervened by now after two atomic bombs, a few reactor incidents, and the general pollution and other environmental changes that have happened over history.