This week on Expanded Perspectives the guys start the show off talking about how two women want you to experience the Betty and Barney Hill Alien Abduction first hand through the power of Virtual Reality. Wexler, a writer and producer whose works include a book about the last mass lynching in the United States, came across the Hills' abduction while researching another project with her writing partner, Charlotte Stoudt, whose writing and producing credits include House of Cards and Homeland. The two were immediately drawn to the story not only for its supernatural appeal but also because of the real-world parallels with racial tensions in the United States today. Wexler says the story was the perfect fit for virtual reality, which has been repeatedly referred to as the empathy machine for its ability to put the user in another's shoes. In its current form, Dinner Party is a two-part VR experience. In the opening scene, the audience is transported to the Hills' home. The couple entertains guests and prepares the dining room table for dinner until Betty interrupts the festivities with a surprise. She's decided to play the couple's hypnosis tapes for the first time. From there, the viewer is transported to the car on the night of the abduction and experiences the alien encounter as the Hills recalled it. Then, a man from Riverside California tells a strange encounter he and a friend had back in 1988 where they watched a girl transform into a giant insect.

Then, in a study published in the journal Science Translational Medicine on Wednesday, the scientists showed for the first time how our internal body clocks regulate wound healing by skin cells, and optimize healing during the day. Burns that happened at night took an average of 60 percent longer to heal than burns that occurred during the day, the scientists found. Night-time burns - sustained between 8pm to 8am - were 95 percent healed after an average of 28 days, compared with only 17 days if the burn happened between 8am and 8pm. Body clocks – known as circadian rhythms – regulate almost every cell in the body, driving 24-hour cycles in many processes such as sleeping, hormone secretion and metabolism. The key to accelerated daytime wound healing, the scientists found, was that skin cells moved more rapidly to repair the wound and there was also more collagen – the main structural protein in skin – deposited around the wound site. Then, a family in Pennsylvania tells of strange encounter with a cloaked, predator like being in the woods.

• ‘Dinner Party’ Relives An Interracial Couple’s Alien Abduction in VR
• Black Eyed Girl Mutates Into an Insectoid
• Wounds Sustained at Night Heal Twice as Slowly, Scientist Find
• Pennsylvania Family Claims Predator Like Humanoid Sighting
• Winchester Mystery House
• The House That Ghosts Built Movie Trailer

• Dollar Shave Club

All music for Expanded Perspectives is provided by Pretty Lights and Electus. Purchase, Download and Donate at www.prettylightsmusic.com and Bassnectar. 

• Pretty Lights vs. Led Zeppelin (Pretty Lights)
• Reaching Out (Bassnectar)
• Evening Sun (Pretty Lights)
• Lost and Found (Pretty Lights)