But what of “real” remote viewing and use of the mind in ways that may help law enforcement, national security, and a host of other wholesome patriotic endeavors? In the video below, Mike Webster, one of Britain’s leading professional remote viewers, describes his job as “perceiving people, places or events that are separated from the viewer by distance or time”, for investigations funded by agencies including police forces and private businesses in Britain and America:

The reality of Remote Viewing may be somewhat less glamorous than the movies depict, but nonetheless fascinating.

True, this isn’t exactly “new” technology (for instance, DARPA ihas planned to use this sort of technology to aid in developing prosthetic limbs that are movable in response to to neural commands). However, in this next step in utilizing mechanical benefits from the technology’s practical application, Dr. Christopher James at the University of Southampton has used BCI (brain-computer interface) to illustrate how people can communicate with what he dubs “true brain-to-brain interfacing.”

By hooking up two individuals to EEG amplifiers that monitor specific brain activity, one person initiates “contact” by generating a series of zeros and ones by merely imagining they are moving their left or right arm for zeros or ones respectively. Recognizing the thoughts in this binary code system, the person’s computer then transmits the series of ones and zeros being generated to a second participant’s computer, which causes an LED light to blink at two different frequencies similarly corresponding to one and zero.

Similar to the recognition used in the binary function, the second person’s EEG uses information “recorded” by the subject’s visual cortex as it perceives the flashing LED, translating it back into binary code. “Brain-to-brain communication” is achieved without the use of language or direct active communication such as typing, etc.

Although this process certainly can be qualified a “hands free,” will humans ever master the art of brain-to-brain communication without the aid of machines? I guess many of us awaiting the release of the upcoming film Men Who Stare At Goats, based on the military work of Colonel John Alexander, might suppose that serious attention as been given to such studies in the past, and that covert government remote-viewing programs have in the past existed–and may still be in operation to this day. Still, it seems that the notion of breeding “psychic super-warriors” eludes us in totality, and no “quick fixes” for this particular brain function yet exist. In the meantime, we are relegated to playing hop-skip-and-jump with binary code and brainwaves, but nonetheless, greater things have stemmed from things so seemingly basic–or in the case of this specific coding language–binary.

Chalked up by psychologists to be a mass-hallucination stemming from social unrest in the affected regions of Zanzibar and Tanzania, locals who have encountered the horrific Popobawa—described as being a humanoid entity with wings and large male genitalia—would argue otherwise. Terrifying reports, often made buy male members of the community, detail sexual assaults where the creature warns them that it will return if they don’t share their the details of their encounter with others.

Having studied the Popobawa literature profusely, today I was shocked to read about recent reports stemming from Kuala Lumpur of what is being described as a “horny ghost”, which in local Malay culture is called an orang minyak (similar in spelling to the cryptid animal Orang Pendak, a Sumatran Bigfoot-like creature). The entity has spent the last week accosting close to 300 families in the Sungai Petani area, and unlike Popobawa’s preference for male victims, Orang Minyak is alleged to be picking homes where there are young women.

17-year-old Kosmo Nurshahirah of Taman Keladi says she was awakened just before six AM on September 14, feeling “a warm sensation on her left ear.” She opened her eyes and found an apparitional form bearing “curly hair and thick moustache” standing by her bed. To her amazement, the ghost allegedly “took off his kain pelikat (a large robe-like lower garment) and started to fondle himself.” The fiend then began groping her body, at which time Nurshahirah became paralyzed as though “charmed” and unable to move.

Similarly, a 42-year-old housewife in the area revealed that her two daughters, ages 14 and 15, were heard crying out at around the same late hour as Nurshahirah’s encounter, claiming a dark apparition had molested them. “My 14-year-old daughter said she managed to kick the ghost, who wore a kain pelikat and black singlet when she felt her body being touched. She screamed and the ghost ran out of her room.”

Indeed, “demon rapists” exist in other cultures around the world as well. Gralien Report correspondent Christopher McCollum describes his learning of what is called a Curupi in Paraguay. Resembling a small caveman-like hominid, the Curupi bears a long phallus, which it often wraps around its waist like a belt. The striking similarities between entities in various cultures around the world that bear long phalluses wrapped around their waists like Curupi—or in the case of the Assyrian Pazuzu, around one of its legs—are worthy of notice. Do such manifestations indeed stem from people’s collective fears of invasion and threat? Or are there actually “demon rapists” that haunt the outskirts of civilization, assaulting the innocent for sheer folly?

Special thanks to Gralien Report correspondent Chris McCollum for contributing to this report.

Could the net become self-aware?

Consciousness and artificial intelligence have long been an area of fascination for Francis Heylighen, who studies at the Free University of Brussels (VUB) in Belgium. Heylighen speculates how the internet may be capable, in some way or another, of becoming “a self-aware network that constantly strives to become better at what it does, re-organizing itself and filling gaps in its own knowledge and abilities.” This, essentially, suggests a pattern of organization similar to our understanding of what consciousness is.

Especially in film, extensions of people’s fears of machines becoming self-aware has been showcased in such futuristic thrillers as the Terminator series. In these films, a computer system called Skynet activates legions of robotic militants hell-bent on exterminating the human race. Similarly, mechanical jellyfish captors are the fiends who have enslaved mankind in pink bubbles of slime in the popular Matrix trilogy. And let us not forget Arthur C. Clark’s visionary work; going back a little further we see HAL from Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, getting his feelings hurt after exhibiting his lip-reading prowess, only to try and kill protagonist Dave and the other astronauts in a manned Jupiter mission.

In spite of their superhuman abilities, one thing that these apocalyptic robotic villains did seem to lack was precognition; and yet it seems hardly surprising that scientists and economists alike are already tapping the Internet’s apparent abilities to “see the future” in an effort to predict trends in the global economy.

Google has demonstrated before that search data can predict flu outbreaks like the present swine flu on everyone’s mind, and as recently as last month World Bank economist Erik Feyen said he could cut errors in a model that forecasts lending to the private sector by 15% using Google search data alone (for the complete story, click here. The way it works has to do with cutting-edge utilization of keywords, frequently used search terms and their results, “memes”, and other popular items of interest to the millions of individuals scouring the web each day. This trend toward toward “crowdsourcing” the interests, hopes, fears, concerns, fetishes, and desires of humankind has even prompted the Google company’s interest in purchasing the popular social-networking application Twitter.

Another company who practices this new art of prediction is Web Bot, who have already put forth their own list of “predictions” for the remainder of 2009, which includes what they refer to as a “Global Coast Event likely in early to mid 2009,” which they say could result in “permanent loss of low lying territory globally,” warning that one continent in particular may receive the brunt of this event.

Could it indeed be the case that sourcing web “intelligence” in ways like this could lead to consciousness on a broader, more human-like level? What would it take for the web to become self-aware, and if possible, how soon might we expect it?

Doctors who have examined the patient call this “the first case known to doctors of a person being able to feel, see and deliberately move a limb that doesn’t exist.” But how are they sure that, at least to the patient, the limb does indeed exist?  Apparently so… and the results of this experiment thus-far are astounding.

During examination the woman’s brain using functional magnetic resonance imaging (essentially, an MRI), doctors tending to the woman’s claims hoped to pinpoint where (and if) the phantom limb might be stimulating the patient’s brain while active. According to the research of doctor Asaid Khateb of the hospital’s experimental neurophysiology laboratory, the results showed conclusively that his patient did actually experience what she was describing.

During the MRI, the patient was asked to move her right hand, as well as to simply imagine doing so, the latter of which resulted in very similar activity (though to a lesser degree) as to what occurred in her brain when actually moving her hand. Interestingly, her left hand is paralyzed (which causes one to consider whether this might have some how instigated the appearance of the phantom limb in the first place), and the same effect was achieved when she thought of moving the immobile hand. Finally, when asked to move the translucent phantom appendage, not only didher brain respond just as it did when her right arm had actually moved, her visual cortex was stimulated as she “watched” the limb move about, according to doctors.

At present, only nine cases of Supernatural Phantom Limbs are known to exist to medical science. Existing research suggests that the phenomenon is caused by a “mismatch between the subject’s well-established sensorimotor representations and a suddenly aberrant pattern of communication between the brain and (a) paralysed limb.” But what other angles could be applied to the phenomenon? Gralien Report correspondent Mobius comments that “if indeed this is true this maybe the best example ever seen of the illusionary universe/mind over matter,” along the same lines as Michael Talbot’s The Holographic Universe. What other implications could this strange phenomenon have, or what other possibilities could it merit?

What is collectively less well-known about Twain is his involvement with the mystical things that sometimes reach from beyond, touching those of us who, perhaps by way of magic… or more likely mere circumstance, tend to play against the fates and influence our lives.

Twain was born only two weeks after the closest approach of Haley’s Comet in 1835, and perhaps it was a sprinkling of the cosmic dust of the comet’s tail that peppered the youth with such seeds of an unconventional life. He would go on to befriend many of the world’s most famous people of the day, including oil tycoon Henry H. Rogers, Hellen Kellar, Booker T. Washington, and famed inventor Nikola Tesla. In fact, Tesla once credited Twain with saving his life; having fallen ill at an early age, Tesla claimed that it was the joy he took from reading Twain’s works that helped him through his sickness. Indeed, Twain’s influence may have saved Tesla, but conversely one must take into account that perhaps Twain was also influenced by the great inventor just as well, since the writer is also credited with the invention of a variety of things ranging from bed clamps for infants to steam engines.

In spite of his interesting lifestyle and variety of colorful colleagues, Twain was no stranger to encounters with the mystical. In the late 1850s, Twain is said to have experienced “an unusually vivid dream” where the body of his brother, Henry, was seen lying dead. Specific details of the dream included a large metal coffin in which Henry rested, positioned in the center of their sister’s sitting room. The coffin sat upon two chairs, and a bouquet of flowers with one red rose in its center lay across Henry’s chest. To Twain’s shock and surprise, Henry died only weeks later due to injuries sustained in a boat accident. Twain attended the wake, and just as it had appeared in the prophetic dream, he found Henry lying in a metal coffin supported by two chairs. Only one item was missing… and just as Twain entered the room, a woman close behind him appeared with a large bouquet of flowers, placing them on Henry’s chest. A single red rose rested in its center.

Twain not only was able to predict the death of his brother, but also accurately foresaw his own last days. “I came in with Halley’s Comet in 1835,” he once said. “It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it. It will be the greatest disappointment of my life if I don’t go out with Halley’s Comet. The Almighty has said, no doubt: ‘Now here are these two unaccountable freaks; they came in together, they must go out together’.” Not surprisingly, Twain’s prediction was accurate. He died of a heart attack on April 21 in Redding, Connecticut, just a day after the comet’s closest approach to Earth in 1910.

In spite of the time and circumstances of his death, is it possible that Twain’s overwhelming presence and character might have lived on? Between 1915 and 1917, struggling novelist and newspaper writer Emily Grant Hutchings, along with Spiritualist medium Lola V. Hays, claimed to have authored several stories that were “dictated” to them by Twain from beyond the grave using a Ouija board. Similarly, in the 1960s Missouri residents John and Mildred Swanson also claimed to have used a similar apparatus (they called it a “Nona board”) to conjure the deceased novelist. Was it their imaginations that created the semblance of one of America’s greatest writers, speaking to them from beyond the veil of death? Or, could it be that the strong-willed Missourian did indeed reach through to these individuals, perhaps just to “stir the pot” as he so often did with his own writing while he lived? It’s hard to say, but Sam Clemens couldn’t be a likelier candidate for such spooky activity, and remnants of his life and work, whether or not they’ve been dictated through occult means, will continue to meander in our minds for as long as the Mississippi is wide.

Raised in the Hindu tradition, Jindal later read the Bible, saying “I saw myself in many of the parables and felt as if the Bible had been written especially for me. After reading every book I could find on the historical accuracy of the Bible and Christianity, I was convinced that the Bible had remained unaltered throughout the centuries and that circumstances surrounding Christ’s death led to the conversions of thousands.” Slowly but surely, Jindal began to renounce the faith of his family, heading instead down a long, emotionally-trying conversion to Catholicism.

It was during his years in College at Brown University that Jindal stumbled into an encounter which ultimately led to his full conversion to Christianity, though under the most bizarre circumstances imaginable. The story involves a close friend of the future Louisiana governor, whom he refers to using the name “Susan.” Susan had begun to act strangely, and Jindal invited her to a Christian concert, from which he noticed her leaving early. After following her outside, he found her crying, a circumstance about which the governor shares the following:

“Since we had been very careful to avoid any form of physical contact in our friendship, I was not sure how to respond. My inaction and her sobs produced a very awkward situation.”

Apparently, the extent of the relationship Susan and Bobby shared was a bit too “intimate” to easily qualify as being a mere friendship, and the two had worked toward maintaining distance, both physically and otherwise. Regardless, Jindal was clearly troubled at his apparent inability to comfort his friend, having to rely on the help of another female to do so. Later, after walking Susan home, he learned that Susan had been diagnosed with skin cancer, and spent much of the rest of the evening consoling her by telling her “fairy tales”.

A short time later, after missing a dinner date with Jindal, Susan began to describe strange, horrific dreams she had been having, as well as sulfuric odors that would appear in her bedroom. The notion that foul “sulfur-smells” were appearing caused Jindal to suspect something satanic at the heart of the matter, which led him to invite Susan to a session where he asked if he and several friends could pray for her. Susan agreed to join Bobby and his friends, but upon entering the situation, Susan began to demonstrate many “classic” symptoms of demonic possession, including guttural sounds, screaming, profanity, and eerily speaking in the third person about herself; at one point, Jindal describes several of his friends holding her down when he heard his troubled friend growl at him “Bobby, you cannot even love Susan.” The circumstances began to worsen, as Susan began to insult each individual in the room, somehow revealing their most embarrassing, intimate secrets. This all frightened Jindal so badly that he describes having felt so nervous “he thought he could be having a stroke.”

Finally, things reached a head when Jindal and others began attempting to get preachers from various campus Christian groups to assist with what appeared to have evolved into a full-blown exorcism. Students were restraining Susan, shouting evangelical prayers at her and trying desperately to coax her into reading Bible verses. Finally, Susan relented, and after reading several scriptures aloud, she finally collapsed, and appearing dazed, claimed that she couldn’t remember anything that had transpired over the previous several hours. Remarkably, Jindal recounts that Susan’s skin cancer inexplicably disappeared after the incident.

Jindal’s alleged encounter with the Prince of Darkness is hardly your run-of-the-mill “college story”, and was suppressed as best as possible by those on his election staff during Jindal’s campaign for Governor of Louisiana. Still, with as many politicians today that describe interest in the unexplained; some even claiming to have witnessed UFOs and other phenomenon, is Bobby Jindal’s story really much different from Jimmy Carter, Dennis Kucinich or Ronald Reagan seeing UFOs; or if you want to go really far-back (and far out-there), Theodore Roosevelt claiming to have encountered a Bigfoot-like creature in 1892?

No matter what the circumstances were regarding what Jindal may have actually encountered, this story reminds us that we are all just people (even politicians), and that the strange can strike at virtually any moment. That being said, keep your holy water and crucifixes handy, especially next time you visit Louisiana; and in the meantime, you can get the word straight from the horse’s mouth by reading Jindal’s article on the experience here (however, you must pay a small fee to read the entire transcript).

The catch is that we don’t know exactly where the DMT is created, though pioneering psychedelics researcher Dr. Rick Strassman has suggested that, in theory, the stuff could be produced within the human pineal gland, which Renee Descartes famously proposed “was the point of mediation between the material body and the immaterial soul.” In the realms of both fact and fiction, the pineal gland has occasionally played an important role with regard to man’s supposed innate abilities to “unlock” psychic powers from within, allowing us to perceive distant worlds which, to the naked senses in our typical day-to-day state of mind, remain hidden. H.P. Lovecraft’s maniacal character Crawford Tillinghast from the short story From Beyond described it as such:

You have heard of the pineal gland? I laugh at the shallow endocrinologist, fellow-dupe and fellow-parvenu of the Freudian. That gland is the great sense organ of organs – I have found out. It is like sight in the end, and transmits visual pictures to the brain. If you are normal, that is the way you ought to get most of it… I mean get most of the evidence from beyond.

What poor old Crawford was rambling about, in Lovecraft’s story that is, was that the pineal gland would allow a “normal” person to perceive “evidence from beyond” through the use of a resonating device he had built. This contraption allowed the pineal gland to function in such a way that alien realms became visible when one stood near it. Funny enough, if researchers like Dr. Rick Strassman are correct about DMT production in the brain, Lovecraft may have been closer to home than he could ever have imagined with his notions that the pineal gland might act as a medium for strange phenomenon. (Keep in mind that Lovecraft is often suspected by researchers of the bizarre for having been capable of “tapping into” ancient rites and other realms with some strange mental prowess he possessed, which translated into his fiction).

In fact, recent studies by University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers found that DMT regulates a mysterious protein that is abundant throughout the body called the sigma-1 receptor. Experiments with laboratory mice that had had this receptor genetically removed yielded the strange effect of nothing, whereas “normal” mice that had been injected with DMT yielded expected increases in hyperactivity until the effects of the drug had worn off. Indeed, it seems that a receptor for the hallucinogenic effects of DMT may have been discovered.

But perhaps of even more interest is the fact that, in addition to small amounts found throughout the body of sane healthy humans, elevated levels of DMT have also been found in the urine of schizophrenics. This brings to mind a few interesting questions; for instance, could finding ways to inhibit or otherwise appease sigma-1 receptors in schizophrenic patients result in a new treatment for the disease? On the other hand, many of the shamanic cultures around the world who use DMT-rich snuffs and teas in their rituals describe entities they meet while taking the stuff. Similarly, test subjects in various DMT studies (including those of Rick Strassman) report meeting similar “beings”, and common to both groups are haunting consistencies between descriptions of these entities. In fact, some believe these beings could even be “interdimensional ambassadors” which come to meet psychonauts in the sub-space realm that lingers between reality and wherever people experiencing a DMT trip tend to end up visiting.

If indeed there is a link between DMT and diseases like schizophrenia, could this in any way mean that a person afflicted with such a condition may have some limited ability to perceive elements of worlds beyond the five senses? We are left with the curious, even frightening questions as to how exactly drugs like DMT work, why it exists in the human body, and how, under the right conditions, substances like this might bear strange abilities that allow us some limited perception of those things which exist in places from beyond.

The UK-based Sun reported today that an odd-looking “grid-like” structure has been discovered on the ocean floor nearly 620 miles West of the Canary islands at a depth of 3.5 miles. The images, obtained by Google Ocean (see above), have led to speculation that this could be the location of the long-sunken city of Atlantis.

Scholars, historians, and adventurers have long wondered about the possible truths which may lay behind the fabled city, first described by Plato in the documents Timaeus and Critias back in 350 BC. In more modern times, American psychic Edgar Cayce was particularly well-known for his visions regarding the reappearance of Atlantis. In fact, in June of 1940 “the Sleeping Prophet” made a prediction that is usually considered one of his most notable “failures”, where according to Cayce, “Poseidia will be among the first portions of Atlantis to rise again. Expect it in 68 and 69; not so far away…” Gralien Report correspondent Will Beckwith shares that “Nothing much happened in 1968 or 1969 about Atlantis, except for the discovery of the Bimini Wall. However, 1940 to 2009 is sixty nine years.” Has William noticed something that might correct previous assumptions that Cayce’s predicitons were invalid? Was the sleeping Prophet merely misunderstood, rather than mistaken?

On the other end of the spectrum, Google seems to believe there to be a technical explanation for the anomalous images. According to one Google spokeswoman, “what users are seeing is an artefact of the data collection process.… Bathymetric (or sea floor terrain) data is often collected from boats using sonar to take measurements of the sea floor. The lines reflect the path of the boat as it gathers the data.” So could it be that the images aren’t showing us an undersea structure after all? At very least, could the images lead to further exploration of the ocean floor in the questionable vicinity, and perhaps final proof as to what exactly may lay beneath?

Thanks to William Beckwith and Randy Bishop for contributing to this report. 

Of course, this notion might have an awful lot to do with who you’re asking, but historically, economically, and scientifically there were many events which certainly could be considered landmarks by just about anyone.

Of course, the election of our first African-American president Barack Obama will be near the top of the list. But is there anything strange or anomalous about this per say? Not surprisingly, there could be indeed. Many of the popular conservative radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh have had a great time this year referencing Obama as “The Messiah” due to his “messianic stature and devoted followers”. For the most part, this has all been mere sarcasm, although there have been reports of “orbs”, the popular photographic anomalies most often associated with ghostly activity, photographed over various rallies prior to the election.

Rick Phillips over at his UFO Disclosure Countdown Clock blog even discussed the possibility of an “Obama Star”, similar to that which Christian traditions believe appeared over Bethlehem at the time of Christ’s birth, making an appearance at the innauguration. “Some who saw or see Obama as almost a saviour figure took the Orbs to be a clear sign `from above’ – as to who was the preferred candidate (Or, at least, the one most historical),” Phillips said. “And, indeed, there even exists in the internet world pictures of Orbs in photos at the rally in Grant Park – on the historic night of Obama’s clear victory.” Although I don’t typically prescribe to orb theories, even the astute Mr. Phillips prefaces this statement by saying “As you know, this blog is not afraid to make sure that the outlandish is at least mentioned.” Indeed, in separating the wheat from the chaff, perhaps sometimes we must consider the outlandish; but does that really mean that guys like Prophet Yahweh might be able to summon an alien mothership to greet Obama when he takes office?

Along the lines of strange things one might expect in 2009, last night (or early this morning, rather) Art Bell filled in for George Noory on Coast to Coast AM, and did his annual “predictions” broadcast. Each year, Art gathers predictions about the coming year from callers during open lines, in addition to reading off last year’s predictions and seeing whether they were bust (”bonk” as Art says), or if they did indeed transpire. Of course, at least one caller predicted that 2009 will be the year of complete UFO disclosure, and that Obama will successfully do what Presidents before him (like Jimmy Carter) had failed to achieve. Another of the more interesting reports last night came from a part-time psychic intuitive who called in and described a strange series of visions he had witnessed involving a tsunami that will occur as a result of tectonic activity near Australia. The caller described this would likely happen around February sometime, although (thankfully) it won’t be as devastating as other tsunamis that have occured in recent years. Perhaps we’ll keep our eyes peeled (and if you’re living down under, your lifejackets inflated).

Sadly, and yet true to form, most predictions along these lines aren’t exactly pleasant in nature. Such is the case with Russian professor and former KGB analyst Igor Panarin, who by looking ahead one year further than Art Bell’s listeners, predicts that the United States will “disintegrate” by 2010. Panarin believes this will occur due to economic and moral collapse that could result in civil war, though he also insists that he does not harbor hatred for Americans. According to Panarin, “There’s a 55-45% chance right now that disintegration will occur. One could rejoice in that process, but if we’re talking reasonably, it’s not the best scenario for Russia.” Indeed, economic collapse in the US would only further hinder Russia’s struggle to maintain economic stability themselves. Fortunately, though he cites “civil war” as being the turning point in the downfall of the US, I think many here in the states would (sadly) agree that complacent American attitudes toward foreign policy, economics, and politics could make any civil uprising of sufficient magnitude rather difficult. Alas, today we aren’t the tough bucks our forefathers once were… though I don’t discount the possibility that this could change, either.

What are your predictions for the coming year? Email me or leave a comment after this blog… I’d be interested in hearing what the readers think!