I’m going to take these two at a time to speed up going through this issue (and to get you the articles). My next post will be about the contents of the third and fourth articles, but I will likely skip any comments on the fifth article.
Here are # 4 and # 5:
4. On the Edge of Science: Coping With UFOlogy Scientifically. By: Bowers, Kenneth S.; Eastwood, John D.. Psychological Inquiry, 1996, Vol. 7 Issue 2, p136, 5p; Abstract Critiques the article ‘Toward an Explanation of the UFO Abduction Phenomenon: Hypnotic Elaboration, Extraterrestrial Sadomasochism, and Spurious Memories,’ by Leonard S. Newman and Roy F. Baumeister, which appeared in the April 1996 issue of the journal ‘Psychological Inquiry.’ Application of intrapsychic determinants of experience and behavior to the UFO abduction experience.
5. The Construction of Space Alien Abduction Memories. By: Clark, Steven E.; Loftus, Elizabeth F.. Psychological Inquiry, 1996, Vol. 7 Issue 2, p140, 4p; Abstract Presents reactions to the article ‘Toward an Explanation of the UFO Abduction Phenomenon: Hypnotic Elaboration, Extraterrestrial Sadomasochism, and Spurious Memories,’ by Leonard S. Newman and Roy F. Baumeister, which appeared in the April 1996 issue of the journal ‘Psychological Inquiry.’ Argument that UFO abductions are a variety of false memories reconstructed with the suggestion of hypnosis.
Glad you posted them. Even if there are not a lot of comments right now, I suspect there are plenty of us still ready to read the rest.
@aeneas: thanks!
Pity, these are excellent papers that refer to a wealth of literalist content such as John Mack’s piece from 1994- Abduction. “Shovelfuls” of info, (according to the advocates of “intra-psychic” construction of false memories using ingredients from Star Trek and Outer Limits) not about alien abduction (according to Carl Sagan) but about ourselves- is abundantly available. …Shame they never shared any shovelfuls with us in their 5 page article, but instead managed to expound on the “too much TV” hypothesis for several thousand words instead of addressing any of the hard work that a Harvard Psychiatry Proffessor invested into the traumatized earthlings.
On another level, if it were St. John the Divine on the couch, describing his visions of the four horsemen of the Apocalypse from his vision to John Mack, and John Mack was to ascribe literal and figurative as well as symbolic triangulation to aspects of The Revelation to St. John with other cross-referenced ancient scriptures from the bible, and start to see the impossible coincidences involved with that analysis- Neuman and Baumeister might ascribe Mack’s sympathetic interpretation of St. John’s abduction as “unscientific and non-empirical”, or “proselytized” and the source of St. John’s memory “inter-cranial rather than extra-terrestrial” …and might have been averted by watching a few less episodes of Star Trek that featured “Mr. Spock”.
This is why the inner mind explanation is but one explanation. I think the better inner mind options are lucid dreaming and sleep paralysis, but they certainly don’t explain a fair number of episodes.