The Micah Hanks Program

This week on The Micah Hanks Program, we launch into this week's news with a look at the European Space Agency's ambitions to study our Sun. Meanwhile, something odd is sending messages to Earth... are we getting any closer to solving the mystery of fast radio bursts?

Then later in the program, there is perhaps no place in paranormal lore that has attracted more attention than Skinwalker Ranch, a property in Utah that is renowned for being a "hotspot" for UFO and other unexplained activity. Joining us to discuss the ranch and its odd history is journalist MJ Banias, an author whose work regularly appears in Popular Mechanics and VICE, and whose latest feature piece for the latter publication chronicles his trip to the fabled Utah ranch location. Banias is the author of The UFO People: A Curious Culture, and was a contributor to the anthology UFOs: Reframing the Debate. MJ's work has also been featured in Fortean Times, Mysterious Universe, and FATE Magazine.

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Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• Liftoff for Solar Orbiter, ESA's mission to face the Sun up close
• Something in Space is Sending Earth Signals Like Clockwork, Scientists Don't Know Why
• Scientists Extend Lifespan of Worms by 500 Percent
• Why are children 'missing' from coronavirus outbreak cases?
• 'Most devastating plague of locusts' in recent history could come within weeks, U.N. warns
• Incredible moment cross appears above Holy Land in 'message from God'
• Inside Skinwalker Ranch, a Paranormal Hotbed of UFO Research
• The Homepage of MJ Banias
• The UFO People by MJ Banias on Amazon.com

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Music featured on The Micah Hanks Program includes songs composed by Caleb Hanks (The Clerk Chronicles), Decepticons (Dreamland, Start the Machine) and Micah Hanks. All songs are either in the public domain, Royalty Free, Creative Commons Attribution 3.0, or are used with permission of the creators.

This week on The Micah Hanks Program, we celebrate a belated Groundhog Day, and the peculiar annual tradition about an immortal groundhog who can predict the future, along with what scientists have revealed about a 3000-year-old mummy that has people talking (including the mummy). We then shift our attention over to the topic of magnetic pole reversals, and the "dark side" of Wikipedia, one of the most popular websites on the Internet. The site's editors have a bias... but what does that mean for the study of topics like UFOs?

Then later in the program we are joined by Red Pill Junkie, a Mexico City-based blogger and commentator on topics like UFOs, as well as traditional indigenous spiritual practices. Few would consider (particularly in the Western world) that there might be some continuity between topics like UFOs and shamanism, but many scholars--psychologists in particular--that have studied both experiences have noted many remarkable parallels. We discuss this with Red Pill Junkie, along with his interactions with the director of the film Witness of Another World, which examines these in the context of one of Latin America's most controversial UFO cases.

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Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• Punxsutawney Phil Says 'Early Spring.' Here's What Actual Weather Forecasters Say
• Listen to the Recreated Voice of a 3,000-Year-Old Egyptian Mummy
• The Dark Side of Wikipedia
• Absurd by Design: The Official Website of Red Pill Junkie
• Follow Red Pill Junkie on Twitter
• RPJ On 'Witness of Another World: Interviewing Alan Stivelman
• Witness of Another World Official Site

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Music featured on The Micah Hanks Program includes songs composed by Caleb Hanks (The Clerk Chronicles), Decepticons (Dreamland, Start the Machine) and Micah Hanks. All songs are either in the public domain, Royalty Free, Creative Commons Attribution 3.0, or are used with permission of the creators.

This week on The Micah Hanks Program, after news updates related to the current coronavirus scare, as well as a House Resolution aimed at getting NASA to prioritize Mars over our return trips to the Moon, we take a deep-dive into the events surrounding a 1976 UFO incident over Tehran, Iran, which remains one of the most significant military UFO encounters of all time.

Shortly after midnight on September 19, 1976, residents from various parts of Tehran had begun placing calls to the local Mehrabad airport with reports of a brightly lit object passing through the sky. Soon afterward, a McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom from Shahrokhi Air Force Base to attempt to engage the object. What began to transpire as the pilot and his weapons officer approached Tehran was more like something one would expect to have seen in an episode of Star Trek than to have read of among noteworthy events in military aviation history.

We explore government documents, historical parallels, and a range of speculations from researchers, skeptics, and members of government pertaining to this tantalizing case, as well as similar events occurring elsewhere around that time, and the event's broader reaching implications over the decades.

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Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• "The U.S. Government and the Iran Case" (NSA.gov)
• Joint Chiefs of Staff report concerning the sighting of a UFO in Iran on 19 September 1976 (NSA.gov)
• Routing and Transmittal Slip from Louis E. Foster, DIA with a DIA summary sheet and US Defense Attache report on the sighting of a UFO in Iran on 19 September 1976 (NSA.gov)
• Philip Klass "debunks" incident in UFOs: The Public Deceived (Chapter 14, page 126)
• Current Wiki Page on the 1976 Tehran UFO incident
• Archived Version of Wikipedia Page from 2015
• Brian Dunning's Analysis of the case at Skeptoid
• Mike Peck's Forbes article from 2014
• Parviz Jafari talks about his UFO-Encounter
• Bruce Maccabee's report on the Tehran incident
• NSA Document with article referencing Algerian and Kuwaiti Observations
• Foreign Policy argues in favor of Soviet Space Junk

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Music featured on The Micah Hanks Program includes songs composed by Caleb Hanks (The Clerk Chronicles), Decepticons (Dreamland, Start the Machine) and Micah Hanks. All songs are either in the public domain, Royalty Free, Creative Commons Attribution 3.0, or are used with permission of the creators.

This week on the Micah Hanks Program, our discussion ensues with a look at a true sea monster, the giant squid, and what the sequencing of its genome has revealed about how strange the creatures really are. We also look at ancient scorpion ancestors, supercomputers in search of ancient extinctions, and then turning our attention to the future, Elon Musk's recent claim that he'll have one million people on the Moon by 2050... is that a practical goal?

Later, the concept of lost ancient technologies has long intrigued scholars and researchers. While some precocious instances of technology like the famous Antikythera Mechanism have been recovered, little evidence in support of advanced ancient civilization from "worlds before our own" has been recovered. But are there references to unique discoveries and "lost knowledge" that might have once existed that can be found in mythologies from around the world? Although we maintain some of these ancient secrets may not have been highly advanced, per se, early experiments with flight, architecture, ancient surgical practices, astronomy, and a host of other things may very well have occurred; could references to these forms of "lost knowledge" be encoded in mythology from around the world?

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Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• The mysterious, legendary giant squid's genome is revealed
• Ancient fossil 'may prove scorpion was first land-dwelling animal'
• Supercomputer scours fossil record for Earth's hidden extinctions
• US Space Force uniform mocked for camouflage design
• Elon Musk Says He'll Put a Million People On Mars By 2050
• Google CEO Sundar Pichai: We must be 'clear-eyed' about how AI could go wrong
• Why The Idea Of Alien Life Now Seems Inevitable And Possibly Imminent
• Scientists Didn't Believe in Meteorites Until 1803

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This week on the Micah Hanks Program, we have science fiction on our minds, and questions about what fictional stories about aliens actually tell us about ourselves. We also touch on news including the myth of "Blue Monday," and a mysterious orb in one of Leonardo da Vinci's paintings, the Salvator Mundi, which some physicists believe had been a real object… despite baffling scientists and art historians for decades. Also, why is one popular online genealogy company catching heat for what it's doing with the DNA it gathers from its customers?

We are then joined by Eric Wojciechowski, a novelist and writer for Skeptic magazine and other publications. Eric has penned essays and critical commentary since the 1990s on issues ranging from ancient astronaut theory to atheism, politics, and UFOs. We talk with a UFO skeptic about what led him to write a novel, Chasing Disclosure, where UFOs, ancient alien theory, and other paranormal themes are par for the course. Wojciechowski talks with us about all of these ideas, and shares his unique story of personal correspondence he once shared with Zechariah Sitchin, the controversial ancient astronaut theorist who gave rise to popular ideas of a hidden "Planet Nibiru" inhabited by an alien race called the Annunaki.

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Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• Blue Monday Isn't Real So Why Still Talk About It?
• China kicks off 2020 with mystery satellite launch
• Space Force preparing for everything, even interplanetary operations, as it sets up
• Emergency Nuclear Alert Sent to Millions in Canada Turns Out to Be False Alarm
• 23andMe has sold the rights to develop a drug based on its users' DNA
• Mystery of Orb in a Record-Breaking Leonardo Da Vinci Painting Deepens
• Eric Wojciechowski's website
• Chasing Disclosure on Amazon

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This week on The Micah Hanks Program, it appears that Earth had a close encounter over the weekend... with the Sun. In addition to astronomy news, we look at historical mysteries involving the ancient Amazon warrior women, how DNA is helping us understand the enigma of early American "vampires," and whether time machines will ever be a part of our reality.

We also touch on one astronaut's belief that alien life exists... and why it might even be here on Earth today. However, in light of the recent troubling news out of the Middle East, we turn our attention to the future of warfare on this episode, with a deep look at the US Space Force, which became a reality after being signed into law as part of the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act. Far from being a new idea, the notion of an exclusive space division of the US military has been around for a long time, with proposals dating back to 2001. However, we note some of the historical parallels that exist between our military, aviation and aerospace innovations, and the UFO phenomenon... could some Pentagon officials even have UFOs in mind with relation to the establishment of the Space Force? If astronauts accounts of unidentified "bogeys" are any indication, then maybe it's not such a far-out idea.

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Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• Happy Perihelion Day 2020! Earth Is Closest to the Sun Today
• Historians believed Amazon warrior women were a myth; New research says otherwise
• DNA analysis revealed the identity of 19th century "Connecticut vampire"
• Astrophysicist Says He Knows How to Build a Time Machine
• Helen Sharman: 'Aliens exist and could be here on Earth'
• Alone In A Crowded Milky Way
• Drone experts believe military, or military contractor, responsible for Colorado drone mystery
• The United States Space Force at Military.com
• DOD Submits U.S. Space Force Proposal (March 1, 2019)
• Space Force: A Historical Perspective
• The story of America's first secret Space Force
• Neil deGrasse Tyson: Trump's Space Force Is Not A Crazy Idea

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This week on The Micah Hanks Program, as we look back on another year we cover stories in the news of mysterious archaeological discoveries, interspecies communication, and breakthroughs in space and astronomy. Then getting to listener emails, Micah gives his take on one pilot's story of a strange group of lights observed in early November, and what they might be; we also touch on the developing story of unusual drones that Colorado residents have recently seen flying by night, which have many residents and others concerned about who may be operating them.

We then turn our attention toward some of the biggest stories not just of the last year, but of the last decade as we head into the 2020s. Landmark breakthroughs in physics, genetics, and other areas of science are paving the way toward a world of tomorrow unlike many would have dreamed just decades ago... but are we necessarily better for it? Chief among many forecasts for the 2020s are continuing developments in the field of artificial intelligence, which are certain to make the world of tomorrow a "brave new world" indeed.

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Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• Dehydrated Koala Desperately Flags Down Cyclist For Help
• Archaeologists discover remains of vast Mayan palace in Mexico
• Lewis stone circle has star-shaped lightning strike
• Christina Koch to Become the First Woman to Stay in Space for the Longest Timespan
• Betelgeuse Looks Fainter Than Usual. Could It Mean It's About to Go Supernova?
• Starlink Satellites Produce Wave of UFO Sightings in the US
• A Big And Bizarre Drone Mystery Is Unfolding In Rural Colorado
• LiveScience: The 10 Biggest Science Stories of the Decade
• Russia deploys Avangard hypersonic missile system
• The 2020s: 20 science and tech predictions for the new decade
• As robots take over warehousing, workers pushed to adapt
• In the 2020s, human-level A.I. will arrive, and finally pass the Turing test
• The Myth of a Superhuman AI
• Stephen Pinker on the Future, AI, and Existential Concerns
• The Year UFOs Became a Little More Legit

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This week on The Micah Hanks Program, 'tis the season, and we lead off with NASA news, a last-minute shopping list for the adventurous among us, and the history behind Christmas traditions involving evergreens that date back as far as ancient Egypt and the Roman Empire. We also check in on odd tales of synchronicities and plant consciousness from this year's annual "Holiday Fandango", shared with our friends from the Grimerica Show and the Cruisin' with Steak podcast.

Then in the second hour, we acknowledge a holiday tradition that has been more than four decades in the making: the famous Star Wars film franchise, which has long driven holiday sales with its films, books, toys and other media. With the appearance in theaters this year of The Rise of Skywalker, the much-anticipated conclusion to the film series, we turn our attention toward the mythological themes present in the Star Wars story. Key to this was George Lucas's influence by mythologist Joseph Campbell, whose books like The Hero With a Thousand Faces and The Power of Myth helped inspire themes in the Star Wars films that borrow from world traditions, religious beliefs, and other themes that often transcend cultural barriers. We will explore this in-depth, and other themes on this edition of The Micah Hanks Program.

Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• NASA maps inner Milky Way, sees cosmic 'candy cane'
• NASA Hails Historic Landing by Boeing's Starliner Capsule, But Next Steps Still Murky
• 'Rise of Skywalker' Opens With $175.5 Million
• The Hero With A Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell

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This week on The Micah Hanks Podcast, we remember the words of the late astronomer J. Allen Hynek, who said of the study of UFOs, "the 'U' in UFO, of course, simply means unidentified, it does not necessarily mean visitors from outer space." While the idea of extraterrestrial visitors remains among the most popular interpretations of the UFO phenomenon in modern times, a number of alternatives do exist.

To understand the UFOs mystery, and why there are so many opinions about what they might be, we turn our attention back to the early days of science fiction and its influence on the idea that alien life may exist, and even be able to visit our planet. We then look at early assessments made by the US Air Force, and how those controversial early studies might have influenced ideas about extraterrestrial visitation.

Such events in history helped shape the idea of an "Extraterrestrial Hypothesis", or ETH behind the UFO mystery. However, with time, many researchers would begin to become increasingly dissatisfied with an extraterrestrial interpretation of the issue. Namely, computer scientist and physicist Jacques Vallee became noteworthy after the publication of his book, Passport to Magonia, which began to compare modern UFO reports to fairy lore of the British Isles and other folklore from around the world, noting the parallels, while moving in a more ambiguous area with relation to the interpretation of what UFOs might actually be. What are the alternatives, how many unique possibilities might there be, and what best can account for the origin of unidentified flying objects? We will explore all this, and more, on this edition of The Micah Hanks Program.

Below are links to stories and other content featured in this episode:

• Maj. Gen. John A. Samford's Statement on "Flying Saucers", Washington, DC, 07/31/1952
• Want to research UFO's? You can start with a new display at the National Archives Museum
• The Extraterrestrial Hypothesis entry at Encyclopedia Britannica Online
• The Challenges of the Extraterrestrial Hypothesis of UFOs
• Jacques Vallee on the Arguments Against an Extraterrestrial Hypothesis
• Passport to Magonia: On UFOs, Folklore, and Parallel Worlds

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This week on The Micah Hanks Program, we lead off with stories that include the discovery of a new an enigmatic ancient archaeological site in Turkey, as well as a lost Taiwanese hiker who describes an experience very similar to alleged "Third Man Factor" cases where a felt presence aids lost hikers and others in life-or-death situations.

We are then joined by David Weatherly, an author, traveler, researcher and Fortean with a wide variety of interests. David began studying indigenous ceremonial traditions many decades ago, before he began publishing books on the unexplained, which include his widely acclaimed series Wood Knocks, a periodic journal of Sasquatch which features contributions from a number of writers and researchers with long-time involvement in the field. David and Micah recently caught up for coffee during a visit to the Bunker, and the conversation goes in a number of unique directions over the course of this lengthy discourse on Forteana.

• 8,000-Year-Old Monument Uncovered in Turkey
• 'Mystery solved': owner of boat washed up in Ireland found in Canada
• People on this remote Canadian island have noticed their US mail being intercepted
• Lost Taiwan hiker says 'ghosts' saved him

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