I recently found some of Dr. Carl Gustav Jung's thoughts and observations on the UFO "phenomenon." If you want to know more about Jung, read his wikipedia entry that details his break with Freud, and his fascinating explorations into the collective unconscious. He may have been a wack in some respects, but he has been a huge influence on psychological thought in the latter half of the 20th century. His work was an enormous influence on Joseph Campbell.
This article first appeared in "I. Dr. Carl Jung Himself on Unidentified Flying Objects" in the Flying Saucer Review, Volume 1, No. 2, (May/June 1955)]
In the course of years, I have gathered together a considerable
mass of observations, included in which are reports by two
eyewitnesses known to me personally (I have never seen
anything!). I have also read on the question. However, I can
only say for certain: these things are not a mere rumour:
something has been seen.
A purely psychological explanation is ruled out by the fact that
a large number of observations indicate a natural phenomenon,
even a physical one (explainable in part as reflections or
temperature inversions).
The American Air Force (despite its contradictory statements),
as well as the Canadian, consider the observations to be real
and have set up special Bureaux to compile reports. However,
the "disks" (that is, the objects themselves) do not behave in
accordance with physical laws, but as though without weight, and
they show signs of intelligent guidance, by quasi human pilots,
for their accelerations are such that no normal human could
survive.
What astonishes me most is that the American Air Force, despite
all the information in its possession and its so-called fear of
creating panic, seems to work systematically to do that very
thing (witness the Orson Welles radio play at New Jersey) since
it has never yet published an authentic and certain account of
the facts, only occasionally allowing information to be dragged
out of it by journalists.
This being so, it is impossible for the uninitiated to form an
adequate picture of what is happening. Despite my own eight
years' compilation of all that has come to hand, I must admit
that I am no more advanced than at the beginning: I still do
not know what these Flying Saucers are. Observations read so
strangely that one might be tempted - if one wished to deny the
reality of the facts reported - to compare them to
parapsychological phenomena.
Because of the general uncertainty as to foundations, it would
be useless to speculate. We must await what the future brings.
So-called "scientific" explanations, such as the theory of
reflections by Dr. Menzel, are not possible without abstracting,
'for convenience' sake, any reports which fail to fit in.
If these "bodies" are of extra-terrestrial origin, as is
affirmed, perhaps planetary (from Mars to Venus) one must not
forget observations which speak of "Saucers" springing from
earth or sea. One must also take into consideration numerous
reports of thunderbolts, or of rare, stationary fireballs (not
to be confused with Saint Elmo's fire).
In such isolated cases thunderbolts can attain to considerable
dimensions, moving slowly from one cloud to another in the form
of a sphere of lightning-like brilliance, and of the apparent
thickness of a half-moon, or again making a passage for
themselves through a forest about 13 feet wide and 220 yards
long, splitting all the trees which lie in their path. They are
silent as the Saucers, or may disappear in a clap of thunder.
Perhaps these round thunderbolts, being isolated charges of
electricity (so-called necklace of pearl [;>))] lightning) are
the origin of those formations of Saucers, photographed several
times.
Often electrical phenomena have been reported in conjunction
with Saucer sightings. If, despite this not yet explained
possibility, the extra-terrestrial origin of the phenomena
should be confirmed, this would prove the existence of an
intelligent interplanetary relationship.
What such a fact might mean for humanity cannot be predicted.
But it would put us, without doubt, in the extremely precarious
position of primitive communities today in conflict with the
superior culture of the whites: the rudder would be removed from
our grasp, and we should lose our pleasant dreams.
Naturally, it would be chiefly our science and our technology
which would have to be consigned to the dust-heap. What such a
catastrophe would mean on the moral plane we can in some sort
judge by the ruin of primitive cultures of which we are
witnesses. That the construction of these machines prove a
scientific technology, and one immensely superior to ours,
admits of no two opinions. Just as the Pax Britannica put an
end to the disputes between the tribes of Africa, so our world
could unroll its Iron Curtain and use it as scrap iron, with all
the millions of tons of guns, warships and munitions. This
would not be very serious. But we would have been "discovered"
and colonised - sufficient reason for universal panic!
If we wish to avoid such a catastrophe, the authorities in
possession of important information should not hesitate to
enlighten the public as soon and as completely as possible and
should, above all, stop these ridiculous antics of mysteries and
vague allusions.
So, after all, there is nothing out-of-the-way in the statements
of ancient documents that all sorts of signs and miracles appear
in the skies, or that people look too the skies for a marvellous
intervention coming to the aid of human incapacity.
Our present day observations of Saucers coincide with the
many reports going back into antiquity, though not in such
astonishing frequency as in these times. But the possibility
of the destruction of a whole continent, which today is in the
hands of politicians, has never existed previously. -C.G.J.
---o0o---
