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TWILIGHT OF THE SKEPTICS
As the Veil of UFO Secrecy Starts to Lift, Some Will Still Refuse to Look
Over the last few years I’ve grown accustomed to having frustrating and occasionally heated conversations with UFO skeptics and debunkers, but I had one earlier this week that took my breath away.
But first, a story about a UFO.
The tale is told by J.F. Martel, who co-hosts with Phil Ford the excellent arts and philosophy podcast Weird Studies. More than any other podcast, Weird Studies has served as a valuable tool for me in learning how to grapple with UFOs and, perhaps more to the point, how to think about a world in which UFOs and the paranormal exist.
Weird Studies is not, strictly speaking, a UFO or even an occult podcast; in the 152 flagship episodes they’ve released, only one has been entirely dedicated to the topic. In a few others (including the one released Wednesday) UFOs have come into conversations about other topics.
Over the years, Martel has occasionally described his experience seeing a UFO as a youth while traveling by bus with his classmates and their teacher chaperone. The sighting was, one gathers, quite remarkable.
Long story short: The object, or whatever it was that floated alongside the bus during a night drive, was eventually…