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Title: Forbidden Science: Journals, 1957-1969 by Jacques F. Vallee ISBN: 1-55643-125-2 Publisher: North Atlantic Books Pub. Date: August, 1992 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.83 (6 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: The Long, Strange Journey to "Magonia"
Comment: Forgive me if I gush, but Jacques Vallee is my all time favorite "ufologist." His book REVELATIONS helped to see that there was a real mystery to the phenomenon and that there were those like himself who deplored the abuse of hypnosis in the service of "abduction research" and the fascination with "crashed saucer" tales and government conspiracies.
This book takes us to his beginnings. Starting in the late 1950s, just before the ascendancy of De Gaulle and the establishment of the Fifth Republic, when he is an astronomy student and aspiring Science Fiction writer and ends in the immediate aftermath of the publication of PASSPORT TO MAGONIA. Along the way we have a first hand account of the "ufo controversy in america" and elsewhere. Additionally, there are reflections on a convention-bound France, where Vallee has to struggle against senior astronomers serene indifference to computers. Reflection on the US: like de Tocqueville, young Vallee looks upon this country with a mixture of admiration and horror. Here and there, there are insights into the looming computer revolution that would explode in the 1970's and 1980's. Vallee is in France in 1968 and records his take on the student uprising of May and June.
And then of course, there are the accounts of love. Like the entry where Vallee writes that he and his lover have just torn the bed and now he lies in the full flush of "jouissance" thinking "why do i need a vow, when I can still taste in on my lips" (DAMN! Those french know how to live!)
Yes there's a lot to get out of this book than just UFO's. But that is the main topic. We see the defining moment for Vallee when he tracks an anomalous object only to have the senior astronomer summarily tear up the print out. We see Vallee's burgeoning fascination with the subject and his passion that science find an explanation, first corresponding with Aime Michel, then making contact with J.Allen Hynek, Project Blue Book's consultant and at the time still a "skeptic."
The insight into Hynek is probably the most important part of the book. We see the role that Vallee plays in encouraging Hynek to admit that there are unexplained cases. Vallee is there when Hynek gets new of the "Soccoro landing" and sees Hynek in the aftermath of the "marsh gas" fiasco. Vallee's admiration for Hynek is obviousk, but there are also other detail. Hynek's love of the limelight and his pride at having little fringe benefits from the air force like his own jeep and driver. We find out that Hynek was an Anthroposophist (a disciple of Rudolf Steiner) and we see him at his most gullible when he brings back "film proof" of psychic surgery (Vallee & Co. are less than impressed).
Besides Hynek, there is correspondence with John Keel in the full grip of paranoia while dealing with strange happenings in the Ohio River Valley, a brief in encounter with Al Bielek (he of future "montauk project" fame) trying to pass himself off as a government spook, an account of origin, trouble history, and anticlimatic ending of the Condon Committee. But most importantly is the "paradigm shift" that Vallee undergoes as a result of studying the phenomenon from a cautious advocate of the Extraterrestrial Hypothesis (EHT) to a proponent of thinking in terms of Extra-Dimensional Entities and paying close attention to Psycho-Social factors and parallels with folklore and mythology and the backlash he suffers (and continues to suffer) from the "believers" who make up the rank and file of the UFO subculture.
As an added bonus the paperback edition includes the text of the "Pentacle Memorandum" written at the time of the Robertson Committee.
In sum, a first hand history of the UFO phenomenon in the 1960's. When read in conjunction with Jim Moseley's SHOCKINGLY CLOSE TO THE TRUTH and Patrick Huyghe's SWAMP GAS TIMES one can get a very full picture of "UFO history" of the last 50 years.
Rating: 4
Summary: Serious stuff
Comment: Jacques Vallee is a respected scientist and an entertaining writer who just happens to be interested in UFO's. His concepts of the 'why' are illuminating, as is his frustration at the handling of the issue by those on all sides.
If you are interested in whats "out there" read and learn. If you on the other hand scoff at all mentions of aliens and such, and consider man to be the center and grandest part of the universe, read this man's books with an open mind and you might begin to doubt some long held beliefs. Vallee is quick to dismiss frauds and charlatians, and focus on the real issues. Arresting stuff.
Rating: 5
Summary: Really Interesting
Comment: This is my favorite journal since reading "Walden" by Henry David Thoreau.
Jacques Vallee is a legend in Ufology (study of unidentified flying objects). More than that, he's a true scientist, which is a rarity in "the field". This book takes you through some pivotal moments in UFO history.
You'll learn a lot in this book, not just UFOs, but the meaning of science itself.
Certainly an essential book for anyone studying UFOs... or the possibility of alien life. (Are we alone in the universe?)
On a side note, this books is pricless for all the little tidbits and reflections on Allen Hynek, "The Galileo of Ufology".
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Title: Dimensions: A Casebook of Alien Contact by Jacques Vallee ISBN: 0345360028 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 13 April, 1989 List Price(USD): $5.99 |
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Title: Passport to Magonia: On Ufos, Folklore, and Parallel Worlds by Jacques F. Vallee ISBN: 0809237962 Publisher: McGraw Hill - NTC Pub. Date: 01 April, 1993 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: UFOs and the National Security State: Chronology of a Coverup, 1941-1973 by Richard M. Dolan, Jacques F. Vallee ISBN: 1571743170 Publisher: Hampton Roads Pub Co Pub. Date: July, 2002 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: Confrontations: A Scientist's Search for Alien Contact by Jacques Vallee ISBN: 0345364538 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: April, 1990 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Revelations by Jacques Vallee ISBN: 0345375661 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 23 August, 1992 List Price(USD): $5.99 |
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