UFOs invading Vision TV this week

On June 1 (Wednesday), Vision TV hosts an evening on the topic everybody pretends they aren’t interested in. The extraterrestrial debate begins at 7pm with the world premiere of A Message from Space, which looks at SETI, and some of the philosophical questions surrounding the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. By the time sci-fi author Robert J. Sawyer gets around to pondering whether or not human life is an imperfect simulation created by a vastly greater multi-dimensional life form, it’s apparent that A Message from Space is a little more thoughtful than the average Jessie Ventura-hosted pulp featuring “researchers” played by out-of-work actors discussing “alien autopsies” by out-of-work special effects teams.

Supernatural Investigator: Life from Other Planets focuses on the late Mac Tonnies. One of the more interesting figures in the UFOlogical world, Tonnies’ last book before his untimely death in 2009, The Cryptoterrestrials: Indigenous Humanoids and the Aliens Among Us, proposes that we should be looking down, not up, for answers. Author John Shirley raved that “even skeptics will have a great time,” writing, “The Cryptoterrestrials is the most refreshing speculation on the paranormal I've seen in ages... Mac Tonnies' final Fortean landmark is the Book of the Damned for the 21st century. Fans of the paranormal: be there or be square.”

It ends with The Great Extraterrestrial Debate, in which SETI’s Dr. Seth Shostak, Ray Jayawardhana of the U of T Astronomy Department, and Rob J. Sawyer excitedly argue with a Rabbi, a Jesuit priest, and an Imam about what the shit is happening out there (although probably a little more eloquently).

Until then, here’s a reminder of one of the more compelling encounters in recent years, when two “mile-wide” things were seen hovering above the English Channel in 2007 by Captain Ray Bowyer and his passengers. “I was quite glad to get on the ground and have a cup of tea,” the shaken pilot says.