Prior to my retirement from engineering, my peers as well as myself used to joke about the recurring episodic basics of a standard Star Trek plot to describe the journey within a corporation, in that we wandered the universe seemingly in search of conflicts, then made a lot of noise about it, got thrown back and forth on the set, made speeches and then recovered our balance in search of more conflicts as if nothing had happened in the hundred or so previous episodes that would cause anyone to question the sanity of being a part of a mission that essentially had none. Is this what Ufology has become?

Eternal reoccurence was the name of that tune and in the fading light of a once and future Ufology, we all stand on the deck of this venture into explore "where no man has gone before" without having any particular mission to accomplish...well, lets wait and see what happens..sixty years on, now isn't it..well what has been the results?

The absence of agnostics in the media portrayal of the UFO phenomenon by staging debates among the "experts" they have  labeled and predigested for their consumers as either rigid skeptical apologists or died in the wool believers plays both sides against the middle which in this case means avoiding a reconciling middle ground that would gain traction toward a reasoned approach in the minds of their audience. The same seemingly applies to UfOlogy itself.

At the same time, the fictionalizing of the UFO phenomenon in popular culture, the CIA manipulation of private research, the continued withholding of governmental evidence, the continued reinvention of cult behaviors, the lack of scientific advocacy, the continued lack of coherency expressed by internal debates among proponents of this theory versus that theory, the lack of funding for research, the lack of balanced media coverage, the lack of younger people joining the organizations such as MUFON, as well as the growing nostalgia for what is now largely ancient history, decades old events in the absence of new inquiry in the field has largely brought an entropic and rather inbred genetic strain to combat the increasing trivialization of  this topic.

Whether it is the CIA playing games with Life magazine in 1964, or the current issue of Newsweek, this editing of the dynamics of a debate, replete with sanctioning  sound and fury as a entertaining diet for the voyeurs of reality prepackaged for manipulating their Adrenalin at the cost of reasoned discussion, leaves in it's wake, a calculated ambivalence that only highlights the fact that all the field has to offer at best are theoretical conjectures, photographs and anecdotes.

We are all familiar with the Larry King Show placing ridiculing cartoons as a context spliced in between their segments as an introduction as to how relevant this topic of UFOs should be taken, which is, essentially a diversion from relevancy. In every show, the further context of the Air Force having objectively "studied" this phenomenon and their public stance of denial by their silence in it's aftermath, while being the perpetuation of a myth based on denial, is stated as fact. At the same time we have a certain Dr Greer with a self defeating certainty referring to benevolent aliens while immersed in what has become a political movement based on it being the default stance of a movement whose intent is to win hearts and minds by innuendo.

One recalls the letter Freud wrote to Jung that his fear was that Jung's approach to psychology would lead to what he termed, "the black tide of occultism"thus earning the young field of psychology, a label that in the minds of the scientific community would only further expose their approach to claims of it as "unscientific". Sound familiar? As much as I admire and respect the former research of Dr Vallee, the insertion of extra-dimensional aspects of the phenomenon had an adverse effect in that the field seemed to become abstracted to the extent that the UFO phenomenon was considered immeasurable.The drift toward this phenomenon either rightly or wrongly ( it appears to be beside the point) toward the paranormal has added the credibility of ghosts, demons, the Last Days mythologies all to the side of the balance scale of how this topic is approached by the public, wherein a ten second attention span or an immediate impression immediately categorizes this phenomenon as something that belongs on a Halloween menu.

Everyone I have discussed this with has told me that which I already know, there is a lack of focus occurring now, so much so that many have left the field in not so much a disavowal of it's merits but rather "we are all over the map" The same correspondents have said that the field is so abstracted that any effort would only further add to a great deal of babble or more so, in that the approach to the subject is essentially schizophrenic. I myself have added to this stew admittedly in a minor role, however, lately, even adding my own voice to this stew seems increasingly counter productive...am I alone in this? Does it matter? Yes, it does but then I am left with what..one hundred lone wolves with one hundred ingredients for an inedible product..so diluted that it's nearly transparent.

What is our aim in this? Idle intellectual curiosity? To be evangelists? To discover one's own role? To entertain? To promote our opinion for the sake of the exercise? probably all of the above and then some. I dont think we have decided on an aim. Until we do as a group of like minded individuals who agree on the purpose of the exercise, perhaps we will remain at cross purposes and simply recede into a role as folklorists. Is this the 500 pound elephant in the room?