Dr. Jacques Vallee ~ The Control System

This post gets a little technical, so I've tried to link out to sources for readers who aren't command line geeks. We're talking about ways to use ubiquitous computer software like grep to analyze, and particularly how to use these tools to refine the enormous dataset of UFO sightings.

Basically the task is to replicate Vallee's information theory-based approach to the phenomena. If we are to truly build on what he has done we must first get comfortable with the approaches. What is information theory? According to Wikipedia it is a multidisciplinary field:

Applications of fundamental topics of information theory include lossless data compression (e.g. ZIP files), lossy data compression (e.g. MP3s and JPEGs), and channel coding (e.g. for Digital Subscriber Line (DSL)). The field is at the intersection of mathematics, statistics, computer science, physics, neurobiology, and electrical engineering.

a reply to: Bybyots

I'm old enough to remember when 'ddate' was removed from the base Debian distribution, but not old enough to remember when it was introduced!

Can you talk a little more about map/reduce in the context of say, the MUFON dataset? I believe the basic idea is to arrange like with like, then replace the multiple instances of factoids with a count pointing to a single instance, as when 'zipping' or otherwise compressing a file. Of course this is the reason why some files reduce much further than others when zipped - their data is more self-similar. An all-black JPG, or a text file that says "foo" 1000 times, will reduce in size when compressed as a ZIP much farther than typical real world data would reduce.

Which tools specifically have you used for mapping/reducing text based datasets, or other datasets like image data, which could be stored alongside the text in a relational database? I see you mention Hadoop.

Check out this (geographical) map project I found based on the MUFON data: UFOStalker seems to be a constantly updated version of that infographic I was babbling about a few pages back.

UFOStalker

a reply to: Autograf

Hey,

I see you are there. The short answer to your question is "none". It took me two and a half years and returning to school to even be able to understand that we would want to use map/reduce in the first place.

It's the multi-disciplinary aspect of this that comes in to play here. 'Member, I mentioned that you and corsair00 woould have more to bring to the table than I when it came to pushing these ideas involving computers forward. I suspect that you have a great deal more database scripting experience than I.

Anyhow, your post was like a refreshing breeze, and I can't wait to talk about this more, but first have to get some Memorial day stuff outta the way.

I'll BRB

NOW we're getting somewhere!

There is that multi-gigabyte UFO archive floating around, but I have no idea how to access it...

a reply to: Autograf

Taking the revisionist-deconstructive angle on the MUFON material, I suppose the idea would be to try to trace the development of particular narratives within the American UFO mythos by using something like Hadoop to produce those nifty “node-edge” relational graphs that show how all of the players, or “agents”, are related to one another, if they are.



A graph like that can be labeled at nodes, vertices or edges, allowing the value-pairs that Hadoop works with to be visualized meaningfully.

Which tools specifically have you used for mapping/reducing text based datasets, or other datasets like image data, which could be stored alongside the text in a relational database? I see you mention Hadoop.

Hadoop has a family of tools that can be brought to bear on structured and unstructured datasets that will help to produce graphs and that sort of thing.

Avro

Hbase

Mahout

Giraph

Just a for instance on this type of software for those that might be interested in what it is capable of.

When you tell a computer to go look for something, you have to provide a model of that something so that the computer knows what it is looking for. This is akin to letting a bloodhound sniff something related to what you want it to go sniff out.

Just think of the whole internet as a mass of streaming data. You can train software systems like Hadoop to go out and find specific data in all that data. But Hadoop's ability to do that is only as good as the models that you train it on; that you feed it.

Before things like Hadoop, the models were based on static data that had been previously harvested, and there was so damned much of it that it could only be sampled. Hadoop and its software family allow data to be used for modelling in real-time, and not just a sample, either; the whole stinkin' dataset can be used, right now.

Who's hair isn't standing on end?

Hadoop, excels at stuff like allowing x-ray images of broken bones in the remotest outposts of Africa to be compared, right now, with a massive database of images, so that doctors without full acess to things like hospitals staffed with radiologists can make more informed decisions and save lives.

It can track flu outbreaks based on tweets.

If you guys can pull this off... we just might have something really nifty.

Also I read kenneth Ring's The Omega Project and that Electromagnetic book. Found something interesting... When it comes to experiencers, it seems there are two common factors that keep recurring:

1) Childhood trauma.
2) Electrosensitivity.

Curious.

Heh heh, we could call the project 6 degrees of Jacques Vallee.

Greetings.

I am new to ATS and was compelled to join as a result of stumbling across this thread. This may sound odd but after reading so many of these amazing posts I feel like I already know some of you. I've grown quite fond of the regular contributors and have been absolutely blown away by the profound nature of the discussions.

It's taken me quite some time to catch up, in fact I'm still only on page 90, but I just had to comment because I needed to ask if any of you have noticed anything...um..."peculiar" happening IRL during your participation in this thread? Since immersing myself in your research I've begun to experience strange things. I see oddities in my peripheral vision. I have unusually vivid and feverish dreams. I've been feeling a deep sense of being observed. I hear inexplicable sounds in my yard at night. I've also noticed some very odd things happening with my electronics, like my mobile phone dialing random numbers or my computers turning themselves off and on.

Maybe these kinds of things happen to you folks often but to me these are not the norm. My wife (a mathematician and Spock-esque logician) thinks that I have an overactive imagination and said that I've just given myself the "heebie jeebies by reading that crazy thread". I don't think this is the case. I sincerely believe that something unusual is manifesting itself around me and it's directly caused by my observance of this thread.

Forgive me if I sound like a crazy person. I just wanted to share this with you to see if you had any opinions on it.

originally posted by: duaneology
Greetings.

I am new to ATS and was compelled to join as a result of stumbling across this thread. This may sound odd but after reading so many of these amazing posts I feel like I already know some of you. I've grown quite fond of the regular contributors and have been absolutely blown away by the profound nature of the discussions.

It's taken me quite some time to catch up, in fact I'm still only on page 90, but I just had to comment because I needed to ask if any of you have noticed anything...um..."peculiar" happening IRL during your participation in this thread? Since immersing myself in your research I've begun to experience strange things. I see oddities in my peripheral vision. I have unusually vivid and feverish dreams. I've been feeling a deep sense of being observed. I hear inexplicable sounds in my yard at night. I've also noticed some very odd things happening with my electronics, like my mobile phone dialing random numbers or my computers turning themselves off and on.

Maybe these kinds of things happen to you folks often but to me these are not the norm. My wife (a mathematician and Spock-esque logician) thinks that I have an overactive imagination and said that I've just given myself the "heebie jeebies by reading that crazy thread". I don't think this is the case. I sincerely believe that something unusual is manifesting itself around me and it's directly caused by my observance of this thread.

Forgive me if I sound like a crazy person. I just wanted to share this with you to see if you had any opinions on it.

I don't think you sound crazy - although (to my knowledge) none of us has experienced any of what you've described...

Oh wait, not sure if it's still happening, but one person (1ofthe9) was experiencing a lot of synchronicity with 'information' (highly relevant to the thread) continually coming at him from out of the blue - well, something like that (can't think how to explain), hopefully he will see this and clarify for you...

I have to say that what struck me as I read to the end of your post is this:

The difference between your 'experience' of this thread and 'ours' is that we have been 'dipping' our consciouness's into all this information 'awareness' gradually/intermittently, but you've been taking it all in at once, sort of 'soaking' your consciousness in the thread...

...so, it makes sense to me that your 'immersion' into this 'awareness' could have attracted some aspect of Vallee's control system to manifest what you're experiencing...

This is just initial conjecture, of course. Hopefully some of the others will weigh in and maybe have more to offer...

I just wanted to check in here...

I've been making my way through the thread for awhile, I'm barely half way through it right now, but I just couldn't contain my..... excitement.... I guess that's the only way to explain it.

This thread has had a profound impact on my life in the short while I've been reading it. I know that may sound odd (or maybe not?) but my attitude on life, my physical and mental reactions to the world, people, and events around me, have changed, and for the better. To be clear, I'm not the type of person who gets caught up in online fads and buys into new ideas and theories easily. I've been interested in UFOs for awhile now, I've believed there was something going on, but never felt any of the theories or idea pushers where anywhere close. It all felt fake and bland. I would read UFO topics in the same way I read good fiction.

From the first page of this thread, something clicked. That spark that goes off inside your head, which you can almost feel branching off into other directions, making connections to events and knowledge that you had but never combined before. I was hooked, and the longer I read the more profound this seemed.

I wanted to post because of duaneology's comment about noticing things in his life. I haven't noticed any strange happenings related to electronics, but I have frequently been seeing fleeting peripheral images since reading this thread, and my dreams are also taking a different tone. I remember a dream last night where I was talking with someone, no idea who, and I was crying uncontrollably, not sad, just a feeling of being overwhelmed on a level I've never experienced or dreamed before.

Normally when I wake up it takes a minute for my mind to wake up, if you know what I mean, but this morning it was like I just snapped back into wakefulness, and the memory and feeling of the dream was at the forefront of my mind. No additional memories or thoughts of it, just that burned in feeling.

I have also been noticing synchronicity in topics being discussed by people around me, random things I read, people I'm running into. It seems like events keep melding together in a way around me that's hard to really describe or fully understand to be truthful.

I know this may sound silly, I debated with myself whether to even post it, but there is just _something_ about this information, this thread, the theory, all of it... I'm just rambling now, but I just felt like I needed to say something for some reason.

Honestly for the only time in my life I actually have questioned my sanity a few times recently with regards to things I'm thinking, feeling, reading, etc.

And I was thinking too, somewhat uncomfortably, that the experience I am having fits withing the theory itself. This feeling is real. I am behaving differently now than before, that's a fact. The idea behind the theory of peoples ideas of reality actually shaping the reality around them, if you become conscious of that reality, and believe it, is THAT itself the feedback loop being discussed? Are the things being noticed the control points themselves, things being re-ordered? Or is it the breaking down of the control system itself? Apologies if this has been brought up in the thread earlier, as I said I haven't made my whole way though.

I also wanted to give a massive thanks to everyone who has been contributing to this thread, the caliber of the work you people have been putting is surpasses anything else I've seen here. Not only that, but the commitment to stay true to the topic and truly seek, bravo sirs and ladys.

originally posted by: duaneology
Greetings.

I am new to ATS and was compelled to join as a result of stumbling across this thread. This may sound odd but after reading so many of these amazing posts I feel like I already know some of you. I've grown quite fond of the regular contributors and have been absolutely blown away by the profound nature of the discussions.

It's taken me quite some time to catch up, in fact I'm still only on page 90, but I just had to comment because I needed to ask if any of you have noticed anything...um..."peculiar" happening IRL during your participation in this thread? Since immersing myself in your research I've begun to experience strange things. I see oddities in my peripheral vision. I have unusually vivid and feverish dreams. I've been feeling a deep sense of being observed. I hear inexplicable sounds in my yard at night. I've also noticed some very odd things happening with my electronics, like my mobile phone dialing random numbers or my computers turning themselves off and on.

Maybe these kinds of things happen to you folks often but to me these are not the norm. My wife (a mathematician and Spock-esque logician) thinks that I have an overactive imagination and said that I've just given myself the "heebie jeebies by reading that crazy thread". I don't think this is the case. I sincerely believe that something unusual is manifesting itself around me and it's directly caused by my observance of this thread.

Forgive me if I sound like a crazy person. I just wanted to share this with you to see if you had any opinions on it.

I haven't been getting any dreams or strangeness. Granted, I've certainly spooked myself - but I haven't run into anything like a Strieber type experience. I just have an annoying tendency to run into relevant information - a library angel of sorts I guess.

At which specific point did the weirdness REALLY kick in?

a reply to: 1ofthe9

For a long time I was what you might call a mainstream UFO/Alien believer. The kind that dabbled in books like Communion, listened fanatically to shows like Art Bell, watched Ancient Aliens, etc. but never delved deeper than the sensationalized, easily accessible subject matter. I believed wholeheartedly that the sightings were for the most part legitimate, that crashed ET craft had been recovered and that the abduction phenomenon was very real. In other words I was exactly the kind of "believer" that could be easily manipulated by the kind of events. I was a non-religious, non-spiritual person with a ingrained hope of something bigger and better than humanity that might one day enlighten us and save us from ourselves.

I was somewhat consumed with this thread and tried to read every link and dive into the writings of Dr. Vallee and other quoted authors. There came a point where everything I believed was turned upside down. As I became more educated I came to conclusions that were so vastly different that it was like losing my religion. Unsettling at first but then liberating.

It was after this realization that I started to notice the strangeness. (Now this is where I am going to sound like a lunatic) I theorize that "something" was not pleased with my departure from the mainstream UFO/Alien belief system. To me it seemed as if the spookiness and weirdness that was occurring was intended to put me back in line. The things I was experiencing, the disturbed sleep, odd things in my peripheral vision, the inexplicable nighttime noises, the malfunctioning electronics, intense feelings of being watched, etc. are all things associated (at least in my mind) with the typical UFO/Alien encounter experience. I can't help but feel like something wants us believers of the media created mythology to remain believers...and I can't help but wonder if this isn't part of Dr. Vallee's control system.

Or maybe I just have an overactive imagination? Who knows

originally posted by: duaneology
a reply to: 1ofthe9

For a long time I was what you might call a mainstream UFO/Alien believer. The kind that dabbled in books like Communion, listened fanatically to shows like Art Bell, watched Ancient Aliens, etc. but never delved deeper than the sensationalized, easily accessible subject matter. I believed wholeheartedly that the sightings were for the most part legitimate, that crashed ET craft had been recovered and that the abduction phenomenon was very real. In other words I was exactly the kind of "believer" that could be easily manipulated by the kind of events. I was a non-religious, non-spiritual person with a ingrained hope of something bigger and better than humanity that might one day enlighten us and save us from ourselves.

I was somewhat consumed with this thread and tried to read every link and dive into the writings of Dr. Vallee and other quoted authors. There came a point where everything I believed was turned upside down. As I became more educated I came to conclusions that were so vastly different that it was like losing my religion. Unsettling at first but then liberating.

It was after this realization that I started to notice the strangeness. (Now this is where I am going to sound like a lunatic) I theorize that "something" was not pleased with my departure from the mainstream UFO/Alien belief system. To me it seemed as if the spookiness and weirdness that was occurring was intended to put me back in line. The things I was experiencing, the disturbed sleep, odd things in my peripheral vision, the inexplicable nighttime noises, the malfunctioning electronics, intense feelings of being watched, etc. are all things associated (at least in my mind) with the typical UFO/Alien encounter experience. I can't help but feel like something wants us believers of the media created mythology to remain believers...and I can't help but wonder if this isn't part of Dr. Vallee's control system.

Or maybe I just have an overactive imagination? Who knows

Reading this post I feel like I could have written it myself it's so eerily similar to my experiences after delving into this... "idea"

Even your "starting point" of being interested in, and believing there is something to, the whole UFO phenomenon but being led by mainstream theories and explanations and never feeling quite right about it matches where I was literally just a week or so ago when I began reading and thinking about everything related to this (The Gut has been a major contributor of such information and leads)

I have never heard of any of this before. I've heard of the ID hypothesis but never delved very deep into it. But once I started reading this thread, I literally did NOTHING but continue this research for days. I plunged myself very deeply and quickly into it, taking breaks for eating and personal needs but not really doing anything else. Then once I spent a day away from it, everything was different. The world around me just was a different place, and my reactions and feelings were different.

When people loose weight, it usually happens fairly gradually and they don't really notice the overall change while going through it, A person that hasn't seen them since their weight loss began however, would see a shocking difference in the person's size. Perhaps the reason some of us are experiencing noticeable increases in high strangeness while others are not is due to the period of time the person came to understand or consider the theory. If it was a slow journey over several years changes might not be easily noticed, if someone condensed all this research and contemplation into a much shorter period of time it seems reasonable to assume the changes around them would be more easily recognized, since the same level of change would be happening in a much shorter period of time.

I promise this will be my last post until I have something to contribute on the subject itself, but I just wanted to post again to let you know, you are not alone

If you're crazy, then crazy doesn't mean what we thought it did. There is truly something profound happening, that's about the only certainty I have left in this world.

originally posted by: duaneology
a reply to: 1ofthe9
...It was after this realization that I started to notice the strangeness. (Now this is where I am going to sound like a lunatic) I theorize that "something" was not pleased with my departure from the mainstream UFO/Alien belief system. To me it seemed as if the spookiness and weirdness that was occurring was intended to put me back in line. The things I was experiencing, the disturbed sleep, odd things in my peripheral vision, the inexplicable nighttime noises, the malfunctioning electronics, intense feelings of being watched, etc. are all things associated (at least in my mind) with the typical UFO/Alien encounter experience. I can't help but feel like something wants us believers of the media created mythology to remain believers...and I can't help but wonder if this isn't part of Dr. Vallee's control system.

Or maybe I just have an overactive imagination? Who knows

Howdy, Y'all. Good to see you James1982 and nice to meet you, Duane! Hugs to all my friends.

I think the very first thing to consider when experiencing weirdness--or feelings of "uneasiness"--is the parameters of the "sandbox." ATS, imo, is a pre-constructed sandbox. Or, maybe, litter-box is a more ample metaphor. Watch where you step, ahem. Are you familiar with the "tar-baby" parable?

WE were anticipated and have come in handy I personally believe. Sometimes we only THINK that we are independent minds who have gravitated towards the truth. That's my current belief.

Step outside the sandbox, and the extremes of "belief" dissolve into sharper focus and become either the diabolical tools for intellectual entrapment...or the key to the handcuffs. If you are experiencing "weirdness," then my best guess is that the programming is breaking down and causing your innate "spider-sense" to be alerted while at the same time causing premeditated internal conflict to get back in line. If you are being "effed" with, then you are probably on the right track.

The magicians are at work here. Sociopaths of the highest order. Every 30 words of "truth" written has often taken 1,000 words of misdirection and subtle hint. It's "there," but takes some serious work given the parameters of the sandbox and the misdirection required to elucidate and define the "problem."

One thing is for sure: The Aviary, and their mission, whatever that might be, are alive and well here. Why?

a reply to: The GUT

Hey, buddy,

have not gotten as deeply into your excellent thread as I'd hoped by now.

Did some posting on the Skinwalkers book thread . . .

And I have read


NICK REDFERN

FINAL EVENTS SECRET GOVERNMENT DEMONIC UFOS AND AFTERLIFE

www.amazon.com...=sr_1_4?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1400863862&sr=1-4&keywords= nick+redfern

. . .

Which, if you have not read it, has as accurate a description of the realities related to such goings on . . . as I've read anywhere.

Congrats on such a wonderful thread. Good to see you around again.

Blessings,

originally posted by: duaneology
a reply to: 1ofthe9
I was somewhat consumed with this thread and tried to read every link and dive into the writings of Dr. Vallee and other quoted authors. There came a point where everything I believed was turned upside down. As I became more educated I came to conclusions that were so vastly different that it was like losing my religion. Unsettling at first but then liberating.

Can you elaborate more on the critical turning point? I'm wondering if we haven't replicated a initiatory type experience in hypertext form...

a reply to: James1982

if someone condensed all this research and contemplation into a much shorter period of time it seems reasonable to assume the changes around them would be more easily recognized, since the same level of change would be happening in a much shorter period of time.

Your assessment of this subject and gradual transformation of overall worldview versus a much more sudden transformation is very rational and well-articulated. I think you are onto something huge - we all are! This subject is full of white and black magick, but largely the combination of both = Grey Magick. (The greys... )

I will do my usual sharing of a couple excerpts to elucidate another profound discovery/conclusion that I came to as a result of networking on this thread:

"Computers are minds that work in the realm of computation; and human minds are minds that work in the realm of generalization, spatial co-ordination, understanding of natural language, so forth and so on. Are these kinds of minds so different from each other, pilgrims, that there is no bridge to be crossed? I would submit not- that infact the bridge between the human mind and the machine mind is symbolic logic, mathematics."
- Terence McKenna, Psychedelics in the Age of Intelligence Machines (1999)

+

"The mental functions that are losing the “survival of the busiest” brain cell battle are those that support calm, linear thought—the ones we use in traversing a lengthy narrative or an involved argument, the ones we draw on when we reflect on our experiences or contemplate an outward or inward phenomenon. The winners are those functions that help us speedily locate, categorize, and assess disparate bits of information in a variety of forms, that let us maintain our mental bearings while being bombarded by stimuli. These functions are, not coincidentally, very similar to the ones performed by computers, which are programmed for the high-speed transfer of data in and out of memory. Once again, we seem to be taking on the characteristics of a popular new intellectual technology."
- Nicholas Carr, The Shallows, Chapter Nine 'The Juggler's Brain' (2010)

I'm sure many of you are already familiar with the theory of Bicameralism (en.wikipedia.org...) which posits fairly recently our minds were split into separate entities, a thinking/command part of the brain, and a doing/following part which was in control of the body. I'm not aware of any additional evidence in recent years which support the theory, but it brings a different possible identity of the manipulators if looked at from the perspective of the control system.

The idea suggested by Bicameralism is that these two separate parts of our mind merged into one unified brain, which allows us both intellectual thought as well as direct and basic control of our bodies. Is it possible the thinking/command part of the brain, being detached or at least more loosely tied to the physical world, was able to "break free" and move on to a different dimension/reality, leaving the doing/following part of the brain to change into our modern brains, which have re-learned the capability for intellectual thought?

This could explain what interest these entities would have for interacting with our lives/realities, because they quite literally came from us, or I guess more accurately them and us came from the same thing. Perhaps their goal is even to lead us down a path which allows our minds to "break free" in a manner similar to theirs, either out of some sense of lonesomeness or curiosity they seek a rejoining of the two entities that were once one, but would prefer it take place on their plane of existence not ours, or maybe moving "up" is the only direction possible.

Or they wish to keep us out of their realm, and keeping us busy and pinned down with eternal discord works into that goal.

Mixing Bicameralism with the control system theory really opens up a lot of different possibilities that I barely scratched the surface of, has anyone else ever knocked the two ideas around together at the same time? I'm curious what other connections could be made.

originally posted by: corsair00
a reply to: James1982


"The mental functions that are losing the “survival of the busiest” brain cell battle are those that support calm, linear thought—the ones we use in traversing a lengthy narrative or an involved argument, the ones we draw on when we reflect on our experiences or contemplate an outward or inward phenomenon. The winners are those functions that help us speedily locate, categorize, and assess disparate bits of information in a variety of forms, that let us maintain our mental bearings while being bombarded by stimuli. These functions are, not coincidentally, very similar to the ones performed by computers, which are programmed for the high-speed transfer of data in and out of memory. Once again, we seem to be taking on the characteristics of a popular new intellectual technology."
- Nicholas Carr, The Shallows, Chapter Nine 'The Juggler's Brain' (2010)

That seems to ring true, I'm uncertain exactly what that means for us though. Is calm linear thought the path to identifying/upsetting the control system, or is quick categorical thought which can make connections?

The second I saw your spiral image my mind made a connection to the following song from Tool, Lateralus, it se

"Black then white are all I see in my infancy.
red and yellow then came to be, reaching out to me.
lets me see.
As below, so above and beyond, I imagine
drawn beyond the lines of reason.
Push the envelope. Watch it bend.

Over thinking, over analyzing separates the body from the mind.
Withering my intuition, missing opportunities and I must
Feed my will to feel my moment drawing way outside the lines.

Black then white are all I see in my infancy.
red and yellow then came to be, reaching out to me.
lets me see there is so much more
and beckons me to look through to these infinite possibilities.
As below, so above and beyond, I imagine
drawn outside the lines of reason.
Push the envelope. Watch it bend.

Over thinking, over analyzing separates the body from the mind.
Withering my intuition leaving all these opportunities behind.

Feed my will to feel this moment urging me to cross the line.
Reaching out to embrace the random.
Reaching out to embrace whatever may come.

I embrace my desire to
feel the rhythm, to feel connected
enough to step aside and weep like a widow
to feel inspired, to fathom the power,
to witness the beauty, to bathe in the fountain,
to swing on the spiral
of our divinity and still be a human.

With my feet upon the ground I lose myself
between the sounds and open wide to suck it in.
I feel it move across my skin.
I'm reaching up and reaching out.
I'm reaching for the random or what ever will bewilder me.
And following our will and wind we may just go where no one's been.
We'll ride the spiral to the end and may just go where no one's been.

Spiral out. Keep going..."

It's scary how that perfectly describes this whole experience in a much more concise way than a narrative ever could. From general ideas to specific experiences. I'm wondering if MJK has gone down this path before, this isn't the only one of their songs that fits very well with the control system idea and what the ramifications for reality are if true (which increasingly seems to be the case) Although he does seem to have a significant trickster influence in some ways too.

It seems like what matters is that your own minds brings you to a place where you come to understand things, instead of having someone tell you them, which explains very well why Vallee gets vage on occasion. Maybe it's less of a "can't say this or I'll be in trouble" and more of a "can't say this or else you won't be able to come to a conclusion on your own"

There would seem to be endless ways for people to get on the path that takes them "here" (serious questioning of reality and existence) but Vallee's theories seem like a tailor made method for getting a specific type of person there. Motivations still seem hard to come by though.

I had a funny feeling we'd end up at AI gods sooner or later.