Close encounters of the religious kind
UNCW professor looks at the world of UFOs
A UNCW professor's book on religious aspects of UFOs is drawing strong early reviews.
Oxford University Press will release "American Cosmic: UFOs, Religion and Technology" by Diana W. Pasulka on Jan. 2 ($24.95). The book will be available beginning Feb. 8 from Amazon.com and the Barnes & Noble website.
Pasulka is a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, who chairs its department of philosophy and religion.
"Pasulka gives wonderful, entertaining insight into the curious study of UFOs," commented Publishers Weekly.
"Pasulka makes a reasonable cases that the spirits, angels, divine messengers, manifestations of God, aliens or their spaceships that humans have been reporting since the dawn of history are too numerous to be entirely delusional, so they deserve serious investigation," wrote Kirkus Reviews.
A scholar in the Catholic tradition -- her previous book, "Heaven Can Wait" (2014) was a study of the doctrine of Purgatory in popular culture -- Pasulka approaches unidentified flying objects as a modern myth.
This is not exactly new; thinkers such as Carl Jung and biblical scholars analyzing the vision of the wheel in the Old Testament book of Ezekiel observed much the same thing.
Pasulka, however, follows a hint from the German philosopher Martin Heidegger, who questioned how technology is creating a new mode of perceiving reality. (Older cultures, seeing something unexplained, would interpret it as angels, fairies or demons. We see little green men, or Grays.)
In her preface, Pasulka writes, "I found out in my research that to understand and move beyond a myth, one must first enter into it." Accordingly, she traveled from purported crash sites in the New Mexico desert to the Vatican archives, meeting with confirmed "UFOlogists" and believers.
She also talked with a number of Silicon Valley scientists -- including Jacques Vallee, one of the early figures in ARPANET, the predecessor to the internet, and a consultant on Steven Spielberg's "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" -- as well as researchers in NASA and the Russian space program about their beliefs in extraterrestrials and UFOs.
Pasulka says she does not believe or disbelieve in UFOs. Her studies, however, point toward mystical connections which may have little or nothing to do with interplanetary travel at all.
A local book signing for "American Cosmic" is being planned for February in Barnes & Noble at Mayfaire.
Reporter Ben Steelman can be reached at 910-616-1788 or Ben.Steelman@StarNewsOnline.com.
