Jung's UFO

   The following is a summary of the concepts from the book FLYING

SAUCERS, A MODERN MYTH OF THINGS SEEN IN THE SKY by C.G. JUNG. 

(1978, Princeton University press ISBN 0-691-01822-7, written in 

1958), and is part of the Collected works of C.G. Jung.

All I could hope to do here is pick out major points of the book 

and relate them as best I can. All quotes from the book will 

start with /and end with \ and include the paragraph number.

Please forgive a word or two left out here and there. I would 

strongly recommend a study of the works of Jung but for those 

unfamiliar I will try a brief description to avoid some confusion.

  Jung says the individual unconcious is as real and as important

as the concious and that the collective unconcious is one shared 

by everyone, built up and passed on somewhat like instincts in the 

animal kingdom. He names the major influences of the unconcious 

archetypes. One he calls the shadow, which is the 'bad' in us, 

another the anima or animus which describes the traits of the 

opposite sex which we can all sometimes display. His philosophy

is that the more we are aware of these traits the easier we can 

achieve individuation, or becoming a whole person. Mandalas, 

circular objects (often found as art, the Aztec calendar might be

an example), are important because they often reveal much about 

ourselves. That is a very rough summary of some of his major 

ideas.( I am not an authority, hence the following has turned out 

to be more of a "best of" quotes from the book. Hopefully his 

overall opinion of the subject can be deciphered.)

  In the introduction. Jung relates that there are manifstations 

of psychic changes which occur at the beginning and end of 

Platonic months,/589 .changes in the constellation of psychic 

dominants, of the archetypes, or "gods" as they used to be 

called, which bring about, or accompany, long lasting transfor-

mations of the collective psyche... This transformation started 

in the historical era and left its traces first in the passing of

the aeon of Taurus into Aries, and then Aires into Pisces, whose 

beginning coincides with the rise of Christianity. We are now 

nearing that great change which may be expected when the spring-

point enters Aquarius.\

  Jung tackles the UFOs, 594/ only with their undoubted psychic 

aspect, and in what follow shall deal almost exclusively with 

their psychic comcomitants.\

  In part 1 Jung cites several cases of spiritual seances in 

which several attendees witnessed a visual phenomenon but others 

present (including himself) saw nothing. 608/But if it (UFOs) is 

a case of psychological 'projection', there must be a psychic 

cause for it. One can hardly suppose that anything of such world-

wide incidence as the UFO legend is purely fortuitous and of no 

importance whatever...in this case a psychological situation 

common to all mankind. The basis for this kind of rumour is an 

emotional tension having its cause in a situation of collective 

distress or danger...This condition undoubtedly exists today, in 

so far as the whole world is suffering under the strain of 

Russian policies and their still unpredictable consequences. In 

the individual, too, such phenomena ..only occur when he is 

suffering from a psychic dissociation, when there is a split 

between the conscious attitude and the unconcious contents 

opposed to it. Precisely because the conscious mind does not know

about them and is therefore confronted with a situtation from 

which there seems to be no way out, these strange contents cannot

be integrated directly but seek to express themselves indirectly,

thus giving rise to unexpected and apparently inexplicable 

opinions, beliefs, illusions, visions, and so forth.\ 

He says that oftens this happens just to those who are least 

inclined to believe in them, which then gives them an air of 

particular credibility.

/614 UFOs..have become a 'living myth'. We have here a golden 

opportunity of seeing how a legend is formed, and how in a 

difficult and dark time for humanity a miraculous tale grows up of 

an attempted intervention by extra terrestrial "heavenly" powers,

and this at the very time when human fantasy is seriously 

considering the possibility of space travel... We at least are 

concious of our space conquering aspirations, but that a 

corresponding extra terrestrial tendency exists is a purely 

mythological conjecture, i.e., a projection.\

/622. If the round shining objects that appear in the sky be 

regarded as visions, we can hardly avoid interpreting them as 

archetypal images. They would then be involuntary, automatic 

projections based on istinct, and as little as any other psychic 

manifestations or symptoms can they be dismissed as meaningless. 

Anyone with the requisite historical and psychological knowledge 

knows that circular symbols have played an improtant role in 

every age.. There is an old saying that "God is a circle whose 

centre is everywhere and the circumference nowhere."\

/623. The present world situation is calculated as never before to 

arouse expectations of a redeeming, supernatural event. If these 

expectations have not dared to show themselves in the open, this 

is simply because no one is deeply rooted enough in the tradition 

of earlier centuries to consider an intervention from heaven as a 

matter of course. We have indeed strayed far from the metaphysical 

certainties of the Middle Ages, but not so far that our historical 

and psychological background is empty of all metaphysical hope.\

/625. Nuclear physics has begotten in the laymans head an 

uncertainty of judgment that far esxceeds that of the physicists 

and makes things appear possible which but a short while ago would 

have been declared nonsensical. Consequently the UFOs can easily 

be regarded and believed in as a physicists miracle.\

  In part 2, a major portion of the book, Jungs examines dreams 

that involve UFOs and then comments on their particular 'meaning', 

too lengthy to repeat here. Some points he makes are;

/636. It must be emphasized however that there is also the 

possibility of a natural or absolute knowledge, when the 

unconcious psyche coincides with objective facts. This is a 

problem that has been raised by the discoveries of parapsychology. 

Absolute knowledge occurs not only in telepathy and precognition, 

but also in biology, for instance in the attunement of the virus 

of hydrophobia to the anatomy of dog and man as described by 

Portmann, the wasps apparent knowledge of where the motor ganglia 

are located in the caterpillar that is to nourish the wasps 

progeny, the emission of light by certain fishes and insects with 

almost 100% efficiency, the directional sense of carrier pigeons, 

the warning of earthquakes given by chickens and cats, and the 

amazing cooperation given in symbiotic relationships.\

(I could not help to think of the the recent Lear.txt when I 

read the following paragraph)

/648. Today, as never before, men pay an extraordinary amount of 

attention to the skies, for technological reasons. This is 

especially true of the airman, whose field of vision is occupied 

on the one hand by the complicated control apparatus before him, 

and on the other by the empty vastness of cosmic space. His 

consciousness is concentrated one sidedly on details requiring the 

most careful observation, while at his back, so to speak, his 

unconcious strives to fill the illimitable emptiness of space. His 

training and his common sense both preclude him from observing all 

the things that might rise up from within and become visible in 

order to compensate for the emptiness and solitude of flight high 

above the earth. Such a situation provides the ideal conditions 

for spontaneous psychic phenomena, as everyone knows who has lived 

sufficiently long in the solitude, silence and emptiness of 

deserts, seas, mountains or in primeval forests. Rationalism and 

boredom are essentially products of the over induged craving for 

stimulation so characteristic of urban populations. The city 

dweller seeks artificial sensations to escape his boredom; the 

hermit does not seek them, but is plagued by them against his 

will.\ He continues by discussing how isolation, hunger, etc. can 

cause visions, hallucinations, in all men.

/655. .. Either these are hard and fast facts, or else it is 

nothing but illusion begotten by repressed sexuality or an over 

compensated inferiourity complex. As against this I haved urged 

that the psyche be recognized as having its own peculiar 

reality... Whatever the reality of the psyche may be, it seems to 

coincide with the reality of life and at the same time to have a 

connection with the formal laws governing the inorganic world. For 

the psyche has yet another property which most of us would rather 

not admit, namely, that pecuiar factor which relativizes space and 

time, and is now the object of intensive parapsychological 

research.\

/667. Everything in our experience is subject to the law of 

gravity with one great exception:the psyche, which, as we 

experience it, is weightlessness itself.\

/678. Modern man still does not realize that he is entirely 

dependent on the cooperation of the unconscious, which can 

actually cut short the very next sentence he proposes to speak. He 

is unaware that he is continuously sustained by something, while 

all the time he regards himself exclusively as the doer.\ He then

discusses the unconcious eloquently.

/681. The only certain thing is our profound ignorance, which 

cannot even know whether we have come nearer to the solution of 

the great riddle or not. Nothing can carry us beyond an "It seems 

as if" except the perilous leap of faith, which we must leave to 

those who are gifted or graced for it.\

  In one dream a male is confronted by a female EBE and Jung 

discusses the neccesity of realizing the anima in order to achieve 

full realization of the self. A tally of those reporting contact 

with EBE's to see how many have encountered those of the opposite

sex would be of interest as Jung relates the anima-animus 

realization is a difficult one, as compared to other aspects to 

it. (Although there could be other reasons for the sex 

encountered.) After again discussing the stressfull, destructive 

age in which we live, he says /719. Anxiously we look round for 

collective measures, thereby reinforcing the very mass mindedness

we want to fight against. There is only one remedy for the 

levelling effect of all collective measures, and that is to 

emphasize and increase the value of the individual. A fundamental

change of attitude is required, a real recognition of the whole 

man. This can only be the business of the individual and it must 

begin with the individual in order to be real.. Large political 

and social organizations must not be ends in themselves, but 

merely temporary expedients. Just as it was felt neccessary in 

America to break up the great trusts, so the destruction of huge 

organizations will eventually prove to be a necessity because, 

like a cancerous growth, they eat away mans nature as soon as 

they become ends in themselves and attain autonomy.\ 

  He talks about attaining individuation and the experiences which 

make it difficult. /721. There is another reason why such 

experiences \(those found while attempting individuation)/are 

shunned, indeed feared as pathological, and why the very idea of 

the unconscious and any preoccupation with it is unwelcome. It was 

not so long ago that we were living in a primitive state of mind 

with its "perils of the soul"-loss of soul, states of possession, 

etc., which threatened the unity of the personality, that is the 

ego these dangers are still a long way from having been overcome 

in our civilized society. Though they no longer afflict the 

individual to the same degree, this is certainly not true of 

social or national groups on a large scale, as contemporary 

history shows only too clearly. They are psychic epidemics that 

destroy the individual.\ Perhaps this is the reason why talking 

about UFO's to the average person is looked upon as "whacko".

/722. To the constantly reiterated question "What can I do ?" I 

know no other answer except "Become what you have always been,", 

namely, the wholeness which we have lost in the midst of our 

civilized, conscious existence, a wholeness which we always were 

without knowing it... "What on earth can I do in the present 

threatening world situation, with my feeble powers?"... To 

worship collective ideals and work with the big organizations is 

spectacularly meritorious, but they nevertheless dig the grave for 

the individual. A group is always of less value than the average 

run of its members, and when the group consists in the main of 

shirkers and good for nothings, what then? Then the ideals it 

preaches count for nothing too. Also, the right means in the hands 

of the wrong man work the wrong way, as a Chinese proverb informs 

us.\

  In part 3 titled UFOs and Modern painting Jung discusses the 

image of the UFO as a product of the unconcious brought to light 

with several (unknown) paintings, again stressing the similarity 

of the UFO and the mandala. Referring to the hypothesis that UFOs

are psychic projections of the unconcious, in order to compensate

for a lacking in the concious mind, he answers the question 

" What is the use of them if we dont understand them? "

/732.  The language of the unconcious does not have the 

intentional clarity of concious language; it is a condensation of 

numerous data, many of them subliminal, whose connection with 

conscious contents is not known. These data do not take the form 

of a directed judgement, but follow an instinctinve, archaic, 

"pattern" which, because of its mythological character, is not 

recognized by the reasoning mind. The reaction of the uncouncious 

is a natural phenomenon that is not concerned to benefit or guide 

the personal human being, but is regulated exclusively by the 

demands of psychic equilibrium.\

  In summary Jung relates his findings are based on /771...not the 

product of unbridled fantasy, as is often supposed, but ..

on thorough researchs into the history of symbols.\ and says he 

spared us with the details (symbols are a major part of his work, 

found in other text). He explains with an example of the concept 

of numbers and how they can be considered "discovered" and there-

fore Godlike, or invented by man, as an instrument for counting.

 Part 4 is a summary of the history of UFO phenomenon which 

discusses the Basel Broadsheet, 1566, the Nuremburg Broadsheet, 

1561, and a couple of other old prints depicting UFO type objects, 

though his thoughts continue in the same vain, that they are 

concious representations of the individual or collective 

unconcious 

 Part 5, UFOs considered in a non-psychological light, sums

what he has said up to this point, although I dont see where he 

treats them as other than psychological. I interpret it as UFOs 

are psychic projections, and just because they are a product 

of our collective unconcious does not mean they can't show up on 

a radar screen.  

  In the epilogue he relates the particulars of an EBE contact as 

published by Orfeo M. Angelucci, "The Secret of the Saucers" 

(1955), and Orfeo's story to shreds of a first year psychology 

analysis paper, picking out almost everything he reports and 

showing what psychological hypothesis it represents. He then

prints the letter he wrote to the APRO bulletin in July 1958, and

discusses the controversy that followed (they reported that he 

believed in UFOs, to which he objected. It is not as simple as 

believing or not.) He also answers a couple of questions from 

the publisher of the APRO magazine and discusses ball lightning. 

The book ends with a copy of a letter to Donald Keyhoe on his 

views.

  I consider this book an excellent addition to my library and 

might consider it to be more on the right track than anything else 

I have read on the subject, although it was written 30 years ago.

Even if all of what he conjectures about the stuff UFOs are made 

of is wrong, there is still a wealth of material for individuation 

on every page. Quantum physics says you cant measure it unless 

your a part of it. Abductions, implants, deals with the 

government, maybe these are all real to the people who see and 

experience them, and maybe if they are real to them, they are real 

to all of us. I think we would be remiss if the answer to the UFO

phenomenon was written 30 years ago and we have not taken the 

time to delve deeper into considering this aspect of the 

explaination. It seems to be a real answer to a real phenomenon, 

and as one who thinks he saw a flying disc, I would be most 

interested in knowing not quite what it was, but why a few friends 

and I saw it, I'm not about to dismiss the possibility that

"it was all in our minds".

                                      Thomas Rhone

                                      May, 1988