Janus (48 page)
Authors: Arthur Koestler
:
Unidentified flying objects (UFOs) 'certainly', 'probably' or at leastWhat is particularly impressive are those sixty-two astronomers -- that is,
'possibly' deserve scientific study, say 80 per cent of respondents to
a questionnaire sent to members of the prestigious American
Astronomical Society (AAS). Of the 2,611 members, 1,356 replied and
of these only 20 per cent thought the study unnecessary.
This means that some 40 per cent of the AAS members would support a
UFO investigation. Sixty-two respondents to the questionnaire even
claimed to have seen a UFO, says a report from Stanford University,
California, where the survey was conducted . . .
In five of the reported sightings the objects were seen through
telescopes and in three cases though binoculars. In seven cases
there were photographs; the organizer of the survey, Professor Peter
Sturrock. a Stanford astrophysicist, believes he can find non-UFO
explanations for two of them.
Sturrock is a strong supporter of a renewed investigation of
UFOs. He criticizes the Condon Report of 1969, which dismissed the
UFO phenomenon and closed 'Project Blue Book', the US Air Force's
listing of UFO sightings by its personnel. 'It is essential that
scientists begin an exchange of relevant information,' says Sturrock,
'if they are to contribute to the resolution of the UFO problem.' [3]
five per cent of the respondents -- who claimed to have
actually seen
a UFO. This is much more remarkable than the last Gallup poll on the
subject, in 1973, which indicated that 15 million Americans had claimed
to have seen UFOs, and that 51 per cent of the population believed that
the UFO phenomenon exists.' Where the general population is concerned,
such figures can always be explained, or explained away, as the result
of mass-hysteria and optical illusions. But professional astronomers
one assumes to be immune to such errors.
The term 'ufology' was coined by Air-Marshal Sir Victor Goddard in 1946,
when he represented the Royal Air Force on the combined Chiefs of Staff
advisory committee in Washington. He then thought UFOs were a hoax, and
was instrumental in persuading President Truman to call off the search for
UFOs by the US Air Force, which Truman had inaugurated earlier to probe
the rumours of intruders in the American air space. But later on Goddard
changed his mind. In his book,
Flight Towards Reality
, he writes:
In nearly thirty years there must have been two hundred thousandThere exist now UFO research groups in various countries of Europe and
claims of UFO sightings recorded in one hundred countries at the
least. That is the kind of basis of UFO statistics now available in
North and South America. Reports upon ten thousand thorough-going
checks have furnished evidence which leads to two conclusions: The
first is that only six per cent of so-called UFO sightings remain
unsolved and unexplained; the second is that, of the unsolved residue
-- twelve thousand unidentified by now -- some surely were quite
rightly held to be what they were claimed to be -- objects of reality
but unknown in origin and technicality . . . So, they were
UFO -- nothing else -- and that is not to be denied even by sceptics
of the deepest dye. [5]
America, mostly run by astronomers and other scientists as a hobby. The
USA Center for UFO Studies has a computer file of some 80,000 catalogued
and classified reports. This centre was created and is directed by
Dr J. Allen Hynek, Chairman of the Department of Astronomy, North-Western
University, formerly Associate Director of the Smithsonian Astrophysical
Observatory and Astronomical Consultant of the US Air Force on 'Project
Blue Book' of reported UFO sightings.
Why then in view of all this, is ufology still in disrepute? Part of the
answer is provided by an amusing historical analogy. The extract which
follows is from
Principles of Meteoritics
by E. L. Krinov:
During the period of vigorous scientific development which took placeIf you think of it, for eighteenth-century minds meteors were no easier to
during the eighteenth century, scientists came to the conclusion that
the falling of meteorites upon the Earth is impossible; all reports
of such cases were declared to be absurd fiction. Thus, for example
. . . the Swiss mineralogist J. A. Deluc stated that 'if he saw a
fall of a meteorite himself, he would not believe his own eyes'. But
especially astonishing is the fact that even the well-known chemist
Lavoisier signed a memorandum in 1772 with scientists of the Paris
Academy of Sciences, which concluded . . . that 'the falling of stones
from the sky is physically impossible'. Finally, when the meteorite
Barbotan fell in France in 1790 and the fall was witnessed by the
mayor and the city council. the French scientist Berthollet wrote:
'How sad it is that the entire municipality enters folk tales upon
an official record, presenting them as something actually seen, while
they cannot be explained by physics nor by anything reasonable.' [6]
swallow than UFOs for us. Hence the same choking and spluttering reaction.
This was particularly in evidence in the course of the so-called 'Condon
Report'. scandal, which grew into a kind of academic Watergate. One of the
best résumés of this complicated affair -- which led to the shelving of
the US Air Force 'Project Blue Book' and to the official taboo on UFOs --
was written by Charles H. Gibbs-Smith, the eminent aviation historian.
Here is an abbreviated version of his account (italics in the original): [7]
For the purposes of this article, I am not concerned whether UFOsThe explanation of the conspiracy -- there seems to be no other word to
are vehicles from outer space, hamburgers tossed from balloons, or
spots in front of the eyes of neurotic tabby cats. I am concerned
with the status and standing of a scientific report, the 'Condon
Report of the Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects',
completed in 1968, and released to the Press in January 1969.
On August 9, 1966, a confidential memorandum was written by a Mr
Robert J. Low to officials of the University of Colorado, concerning
the proposed contract between this University and the US Air Force,
for the former to conduct research into UFOs, and be paid for this
project out of public funds to the tune of some half a million
dollars. The project was to be under the direction of Dr Edward
U. Condon, with Mr Low (a member of the University staff) as the
project co-ordinator and 'key operations man'. The memorandum in
question was written before the contract was signed between
the University and the Air Force.
The Low memorandum was entitled 'Some Thoughts on the UFO Project',
and included the following passages (my italics):
'. . . Our study would be conducted almost exclusively by
non-believers who, though they couldn't possibly prove a
negative result, could and probably would add an impressive body of
evidence that there is no reality to the observations. The trick
would be, I think, to describe the project so that, to the public,
it would appear a totally objective study, but, to the scientific
community, would present the image of a group of non-believers
trying their best to be objective, but having an almost zero
expectation of finding a saucer. One way to do this would be to
stress investigation, not of the physical phenomena, but rather
of the people who do the observing -- psychology and sociology
of persons and groups who report seeing UFOs. If the emphasis
were put here, rather than on examination of the old question
of the physical reality of the saucer, I think the scientific
community would quickly get the message. . . . I'm inclined
to feel at this early stage that, if we set up the thing right
and take pains to get the proper people involved and have success
in presenting the image we want to present to the scientific
community, we could carry the job off to our benefit . . .'
This memorandum was accidentally discovered by a researcher late in
1967, and was revealed to the public in Look magazine in May
of 1968 . . .
The Low memorandum can only be viewed as a deliberate act calculated
to deceive; to deceive first the scientific community, and, through
them, the public at large. I know of no modern parallel to such a
cynical act of duplicity on the part of a university official . . . By
the writing of such a document, the integrity of the entire project
was shattered in advance. Mr Low's words disclose that everything in
the report -- unbeknown to the reader, be he scientist or layman --
could ultimately play its part in presenting the angled case whereby
the 'scientific community would quickly get the message'. This, in
plain language, means that a deliberate perversion of the truth was
planned before the contract with the Air Force was signed; which,
in turn, points to an agreement with someone, or some body, as to
what that 'message' should be. Thus the spirit of perversion must
inevitably have pervaded the whole fabric of the report; conditioned
what was included, and what was excluded; what was played up, and
what was played down; what was said in a particular manner, and what
was not said; what was implied, and what was not implied . . .
The Low memorandum also conveys an implied contempt for the subject of
the UFOs which the University was being handsomely paid to investigate
. . .
What underlines the dishonesty which surrounds the whole project is
the fact that at no time has the Low memorandum been repudiated,
or even deplored, by any of the parties to the deal. Neither
the University of Colorado nor the Air Force has had a word of
explanation to offer for behaviour which cuts at the very roots of
scientific integrity.
describe it -- is not difficult to guess. Some of the scientists on the
committee had a genuine horror of getting involved with 'little green
men from Venus' and refused to make a distinction between serious UFO
research and the tales of crackpots and hoaxers. There are plenty of
precedents for such an attitude in the history of science; long before
the denial of meteors, some of Galileo's fellow-astronomers denied the
existence of Jupiter's moons which he had discovered, and refused even
to look through his telescope because they felt sure that those moons
were an optical illusion.*
* See The Sleepwalkers, Ch. VIII, 6.As for the Air Force and other official agencies, they well remembered the
mass-hysteria and panic released by Orson Welles's 1938 broadcast about
a Martian invasion, and were anxious to prevent a repetition. Moreover,
Government agencies do not like to admit that there are things going
on in the nation's sky which they are unable to explain. The upshot of
it all was that in December 1969, the US Secretary for Air officially
announced that further research 'cannot be justified on the ground of
national security or in the interest of science', and closed 'Project
Blue Book' down.
In contrast to the American attitude, French Government agencies frankly
admitted that they took a lively interest in UFOs, encouraged the population
to report sightings to the nearest gendarmerie, and ordered the gendarmes
to report their investigations through official channels. More than that:
in a remarkable radio interview in 1975, the French Minister of Defence,
Robert Galley, explained in some detail the methods used to collect evidence
on UFOs, insisted repeatedly on the necessity 'to keep an open mind',
and affirmed that in his opinion the phenomena in question were 'to date
unexplained or badly explained'. He also came out in favour of a suggestion
by Claude Poher, Head of Research of the National Agency for Space Research,
to construct automated observation posts to establish correlations between
variations of the earth's magnetic field and passing UFOs. And yet the French
are supposed to be a nation of sceptics.
What are we to conclude? Open-minded scientists, when confronted with
prima facie evidence for phenomena which they cannot explain, go on
collecting data in the hope that an explanation will eventually be
found. This hope may be spurious, a product of the rationalist illusion,
but there is no alternative strategy in science -- except the ostrich's,
who follows the maxim: 'What I cannot explain cannot exist.' Granted that
even the best-documented UFO cases resemble a 'festival of absurdity', we
must also realize that when we approach the borders of science, whether in
ESP or quantum physics or ufology, we must expect to encounter phenomena
which seem to us paradoxical or absurd. To quote once more Aimé Michel:
[8]
It must never be forgotten that in any manifestation of a superhuman
nature the apparently absurd is what one must expect. 'Why do you
take so much trouble about your food and your house?' one of my cats
asked me one day. 'What an absurd lot of upheaval, when everything can
be found in the dust-bins, and there is good shelter under the cars.'
REFERENCES
Prologue: The New Calendar (pages 1 to 20)
1. Time, New York, 29 January 1965.
2. Vaihinger (1911).
3. von Bertalanffy (1956).
4. MacLean (1962).
5. MacLean (1973).
6. MacLean (1958).
7. Gaskell (1908), pp. 65-7.
8. Wood Jones and Porteus (1929), pp. 27-8.
9. Lorenz (1966).
10. Russell (1950), p. 141.
PART ONE: OUTLINE OF A SYSTEM
Chapter I: The Holarchy (pages 23 to 56)
1. Frankl (1969), pp. 397-8.
2. Morris (1967).
3. Quoted by Frankl (1969).
4. Smuts (1926).
5. Pattee (1970).
6. Weiss (1969), p. 193.
7. Needham, J. (1936).
8. Needham, J. (1945).
9. Koestler (1964, 1967).
10. Koestler (1967).
11. Jevons (1972), p. 64.
12. Ruyer (1974).
13. Gerard (1957).
14. Gerard (1969), p. 228.
15. Thorpe (1974), p. 35.
16. Bonner (1965). p. 136.
17. Waddington (1957).
18. de St Hiiaire(1818).
19. Simon (1962).
20. Miller (1964).
21. Koestler(1969a).
22. Jaensch (1930).
23. Kluever (1933).
24. Penfield and Roberts (1959).
25. Frankl (1969).
Chapter II: Beyond Eros and Thanatos (pages 57 to 69)
1. Freud (1920), p. 63.
2. ibid., pp. 3-5.
3. Jones (1953), Vol. I, p. 142.
4. Horney (1939).
5. Pearl in Enc. Brit., 14th ed.
6. ibid.
7. Thomas (1974), p. 28.
8. ibid.
9. ibid., pp. 28-30.
Chapter IV: Ad Majorem Gloriam ... (pages 77 to 97).
1. Hayek (1966).
2. Milgram (1975), p. 18.
3. ibid.
4. Milgram (1974), p. 166.
5. ibid., p. 71.
6. ibid., p. 167.
7. ibid.
8. ibid., p. 131.
9. ibid., p. 132.
10. ibid.
11. ibid., p. 8.
12. ibid., p. 9.
13. ibid., p. 148.
14. Milgram (1975), p. 20.
15. Milgram (1974), p. 188.
16. Calder (1976), pp. 124-7.
17. Calder (1976).
18. Calder (1976a), p. 127.
19. Prescott (1964), p. 62.
20. The Times, London, 27 July 1966.
Chapter V: An Alternative to Despair (pages 98 to 106)
1. Hyden (1961).
2. Koestler (1967).
PART TWO: THE CREATIVE MIND
Chapter VI: Humour and Wit (pages 109 to 130)
1. Koestler (1948, 1959, 1964 and 1967).
2. Koestler (1974).
3. de Boulogne (1862).
4. Foss (1961).
5. Freud (1940), Vol. VI.
6. Huxley, A. (1961).
Chapter VIII: The Discoveries of Art (pages 137 to 161)
1. Jones (1957), Vol. 3, p. 364.
2. Pribram et al. (1960), p. 9.
3. Gellhorn (1957).
4. See Koestler (1964), Book I, Ch. V-XI.
5. Hadamard (1949).
6. Popper (1975).
7. ibid.
8. Koestler (1964, 1968, etc.).
9. Szent-Györgyi (1957).
10. Gombrich (1962), pp. 9, 120.
PART THREE: CREATIVE EVOLUTION
Chapter IX: Crumbling Citadels (pages 165 to 192)
1. Skinner (1953), pp. 30-1.
2. Jaynes (1976), p. xx.
3. Watson (1938), pp. 198 f.
4. Skinner (1953), p. 252.
5. ibid., pp. 108-9.
6. Skinner (1957), p. 163.
7. ibid., p. 438.
8. ibid., p. 439.
9. ibid., p. 150.
10. ibid., p. 206.
11. Koestler (1967), p. 12n.
12. Chomsky (1959).
13. cf., e.g., Macbeth (1971).
14. Huxley, J. (1957) quoted by Eisley (1961), p. 336.
15. Waddington (1957), pp. 64-5.
16. von Bertalanffy (1969), p. 67.
17. ibid.
18. Hardy (1965), p. 207.
19. von Bertalanffy (1969), p. 65.
20. Huxley, J. (1954), p. 14.
21. Waddington (1952).
22. Monod (1971), p. 121.
23. ibid., p. 122.
24. ibid.
25. ibid., p. 146.
26. Darwin, quoted by Macbeth (1971), p. 101.
27. Koestler (1967), pp. 128-9.
28. Grassé (1973).
29. Tinbergen (1951), p. 189.
30. ibid., p. 9.
31. Macbeth (1971), pp. 71-2.
32. von Bertalanffy (1969), p. 66.
33. Jenkin (1867).
34. Hardy (1965), p. 80.
35. Darwin, F., quoted by Hardy (1965), p. 81.
36. Bateson (1902).
37. Grassé (1973), p. 21.
38. ibid., p. 351.
39. ibid.
40. ibid.
41. Bateson, G., private communIcation, 2 July 1970.
42. Bateson, W (1913), p. 248.
43. Johannsen (1923), p. 140.
44. Butler (1951 ed.), p. 167, quoted by Himmelfarb (1959), p. 362.
46. Beadle (1963).
47. Grassé (1973), P. 369.
48. Simpson, Pittendrigh and Tiffany (1957), p. 330.
49. Grassé (1973).
50. Gorini (1966).
51. Koestler (1967), p. 133 -- based on de Beer (1940), p. 148,
and Hardy (1965), p. 212.
52. Cannon (1958), p. 118.
53. Monod (1971), p. 9.
54. ibid., pp. 21-2.
55. Grassé (1973), p. 277.
Chapter X: Lamarck Revisited (pages 193 to 204)
1. Kammerer in New York Evening Post, 23 February 1924.
2. Simpson (1950) quoted by Hardy (1965), p. 14.
3. Thomson (1908) quoted by Wood Jones (1943), p. 9.
4. Darlington in preface to reprint of On the Origin of Species (1950).
5. Spencer (1893), Vol. I, p. 621.
6. Haldane (1940), p. 39.
7. Huxley, J. (1954), p. 14.
8. McConnell (1965).
9. The Times, London, 26 June 1970.
10. Grassé (1973), p. 366.
11. ibid., p. 367.
12. Koestler (1971), p. 130.
13. Koestler (1967), pp. 158-9.
14. Waddington (1957), p. 182.
15. ibid.
16. Koestler and Smythies (1969), pp. 382 f.
17. Wood Jones (1943, p. 22.
18. Quoted by Smith (1975), pp. 162-3.
Chapter XI: Strategies and Purpose in Evolution (page 205 to 226)
1. Simpson, Pittendrigh and Tiffany (1957), p. 472.
2. Simpson (1949), p. 180.
3. Spurway (1949).
4. Whyte (1965).
5. Waddington (1957), p. 79.
6. Hardy (1965), p. 211.
7. Koestler (1967), pp. 148-9.
8. Simpson (1950), quoted by Hardy (1965), p. 14.
9. Sinnott (1961), p. 45.
10. Muller (1943), quoted by Sinnott (1961), p. 45.
11. Coghill (1929).
12. Hardy (1965), p. 176.
13. ibid., pp. 172, 192-3.
14. Huxley,J. (1964), p. 13.
15. Hardy (1965), de Beer (1940), Takhtajan (1972) and Koltsov (1936).
16. Koestler (1967), pp. 163-4.
17. Young (1950), p. 74.
18. de Beer (1940), p. 118.
19. Quoted by Takhtajan (1972).
20. ibid.
21. Koestler (1967), p. 166.
22. Hamburger (1973).
23. Herrick (1961).
24. Schrödinger (1944), p. 72.
25. Szent-Györgyi (1974)
26. ibid.
27. Grassé (1973), p. 401.
28. Waddington (1961).
PART FOUR: NEW HORIZONS
Chapter XII: Free Will in a Hierarchic Context (pages 229 to 241)
1. Hardy (1965), p. 229.
2. Thorpe (1966a).
3. Heisenberg (1969). p. 113.
4. Pauli (1952), p. 164.
5. Popper (1950).
6. Polanyi (1966).
7. MacKay (1966).
Chapter XIII: Physics and Metaphysics (pages 242 to 273)
1. New Scientist, 25 January 1973, p. 209.
2. Capra (1975), p. 52.
3. Newton, quoted by Capra (1975), p. 57.
4. Russell (1927), p. 163.
5. Capra (1975), p. 77.
6. Koestler (1972, 1973 and 1976).
7. Heisenberg quoted by Burt (1967), p. 80.
8. Heisenberg (1969), pp. 63-4.
9. Koestler (1972), p. 51.
10. Eccles (1953), pp. 276-7.
11. ibid., p. 279.
12. Firsoff (1967), pp. 102-3.
13. Dobbs (1967).
14. Walker (1973).
15. Heisenberg (1958), pp. 48-9.
16. Jeans (1937).
17. Hoyle (1966).
18. Wheeler quoted by Chase (1972).
19. Wheeler (1967), p. 246.
20. Margenau (1967), p. 218.
21. Bohm and Hiley (1974).
22. Margenau (1967), p. 218.
23. Jung (1960), p. 318.
24. ibid., p. 435.
25. ibid., p. 420.
26. Kammerer (1919), p. 93.
27. ibid., p. 165.
28. ibid., p. 456.
29. Quoted by Przibram (1926).
30. Koestler (1973), pp. 191-3.
31. Pauli (1952).
32. ibid., p. 164.
33. Jung (1960), p. 514.
34. Schopenhauer (1859).
35. della Mirandola (1557), p. 40.
36. Weaver (1963).
37. Bohm (1951).
38. Schrödinger (1944), p. 83.
39. Harvie (1973), p. 133.
40. Price quoted by Dobbs (1967), p. 239.
41. Dobbs (1967), p. 239.
42. Burt (1968), pp. 50, 58-9.
43. Grassé (1973), p. 401.
Chapter XIV: A Glance through the Keyhole (pages 274 to 286)
1. Wallace quoted by Macbeth (1971), p. 103.
2. Quoted by Macbeth (1971), p. 103.
3. Herrick (1961), pp. 398-9.
4. Wallace quoted by Macbeth (1971), p. 103.
5. Koestler (1967), pp. 297 f.
6. Koestler (1959), p. 55 and (1964,), p. 342.
7. Butterfield (1924), p. 104.
8. Huxley, J. (1954), p. 12.
9. Margenau (1967), pp. 223-4.
10. Price (1949), pp. 105-13.
11. New Scientist, 21 April 1977.
12. ibid.
13. ibid
14. Koestler (1937 and 1954).
APPENDICES
Appendix I: Beyond Atomism and Holism -- The Concept of the Holon
(pages 289 to 311)
1. von Bertalanffy (1952).
2. Koestler (1967).
3. Koestler and Smythies, eds. (1969).
4. Chomsky (1965).
5. Tinbergen (1951); Thorpe (1956).
6. Herrick (1981); Weiss, ed. (1950), etc.
7. Simon (1962).
8. Thompson (1942.
9. Koestler (1967).
10. von Bertalanffy (1952).
11. Waddington (1957).
12. ibid.
13. Tinbergen (1951).
14. Koestler and Jenkins (1965).
15. Penfield and Roberts (1969).
16. MacLean (1958).
17. Weiss in Jeffress, ed. (1951).
18. Hebb (1958).
19. Bartlett (1958).
20. von Bertalanffy (1952).
21. Child (1925).
22. Miller et at. (1960).
Appendix II: An Experiment in Perception (pages 312 to 316)
1. e.g. Sperling (1960); Averbach (1963); Broadbent (1963).
2. Osgood (1953).
3. Woodworth and Schlosberg (1954).
4. ibid., p. 697.
Appendix III: Notes on the Autonomic Nervous System (pages 317 to 318)
1. Allport (1924).
2. Olds (1960).
3. Hebb (1949).
4. Pribram (1966).
5. Gellhorn (1963).
6. ibid.
7. Cobb (1950).
8. Pribram (1966), p. 9.
9. Gellhorn (1957).
Appendix IV: UFOs: A Festival of Absurdity (pages 319 to 325)
1. Sagan (1973), pp. 366-7.
2. Michel (1974)
3. New Scientist, 31 March 1977.
4. International Herald Tribune, 22 April 1977.
5. Goddard (1975), pp. 106-7.
6. Krinov (1960), p. 9.
7. Gibbs-Smith (1970).
8. Michel (1974), p. 255.
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