Future Fossils

For Episode 150 we welcome back Sean Esbjörn-Hargens, one of the most formidable and daring intellects I know, and the author of a new paper integrating over 650 books on UFOs and the paranormal, from over 150 disciplines, to trace the outline of a unifying meta-theory of the weird. In this episode, we discuss how Sean reconciles ten different hypotheses for the UFO phenomenon with his “mutual enactment hypothesis,” an updated ontology based on reconstructive post-modernism and Indigenous ways of knowing. I tell the story of the most powerful and transformative experiences of my life, as a case study in high weirdness. We talk about the distinctions between the real, the Real, the hypo-real, and the hyper-real, and offer examples from film, literature, and comparative religion.Do you have incredulous friends? Show them the extraordinary website Sean made with Tom Curren, WhatsUpWithUFOs.comRead Sean’s paper, “Our Wild Kosmos!: An Exo Studies Exploration of the Ontological Status of Non-Human Intelligences”Rea