Official Statement
Dr. Courtney Brown
20 January 1997
To Whom It May Concern,
It is with both great concern and enthusiasm that I address all of you today who are willing to listen to me. I, and many of my colleagues here at The Farsight Institute, have learned a great deal these past weeks. Though many of you have been following the recent events surrounding the Institute, much of what I report below will be new to most of you. Let me explain.
To begin with a re-cap of the events of the past weeks, in late 1996, I reported on a series of remote viewing sessions that were conducted here at The Farsight Institute. This report was made live on the Art Bell radio talk show. The substance of the remote viewing sessions was the apparent object that was following the comet Hale-Bopp. The remote viewing results clearly suggest that the object was artificial in nature, and that it was under intelligent control. The summaries of these sessions can be found at our Web site.
The targeting of this object was a consequence of a photograph taken of the object (which was released on the same day as our remote viewing sessions) by the amateur astronomer, Chuck Shramek. To target the object with our remote viewing sessions, we did not use Shramek's photo. Rather, we used the verbal cue, "Anomalous object near Hale-Bopp comet (current time)."
Immediately before assigning the target to our professional remote viewers, we at the Institute made some phone calls to professional contacts we had in the astronomical community to ascertain whether there indeed was any knowledge of such an object. We received an affirmative response from one astronomer who talked to our Webmaster.
About one week after my appearance on the Art Bell show, the astronomer mentioned above called us and told us that he had received other information about the object. When asked by us, he offered to send us some photographs of the object that he had obtained. At the time, we felt certain that the photographs were his, or were at least under his control.
He also said he had other information relating to the object, including a recording of a radio transmission originating from the object. He did not offer to share this other information with us, and we did not ask for it. We were eager to obtain physical confirming evidence of our remote viewing sessions that could be seen as a form of scientific feedback. The astronomer sent us three rolls of film that we then developed. Two of the rolls were blank when developed.
But the other roll had five very good astronomical photographs, unevenly placed along the film strip. The photos clearly showed the comet as well as the companion object. When the photos were sent to us, the astronomer asked us to share them only with our inner group, and never to associate his name with them. He also mentioned that he hoped to have a news conference within one week pertaining to the evidence that was being gathered and analyzed.
After receiving the three undeveloped rolls of film from the astronomer, we had them developed. I, myself, have personally held and examined the developed film. Our Webmaster then scanned the images directly from the black and white negatives into a computer. She digitally enhanced the images by putting them through a number of filters. She also enlarged one of the images so as to clearly show the comet and its companion.
Soon after receiving the photographs mentioned above, Art Bell contacted me asking if anything could be done to help Chuck Shramek, who was under considerable attack from lots of people since he released his photograph of the comet and its companion. At first I did not know what to say to Art; we had already presented our remote viewing results, and that is all we do... remote viewing.
But I remembered the photographs, and I called Art again suggesting that we could do another radio show where we talked about the pictures, as long as we agreed not to post or distribute the pictures, nor to talk about the identity of the astronomer. We sent a copy of one of the pictures (via email) to Art Bell and Whitley Strieber.
In the radio interview pertaining to the pictures, I and our Webmaster clearly stated that the evidence that we had gathered was to be considered only anecdotally by others until the astronomer had a chance to come forward with a formal presentation of his evidence. This photo was not used by The Farsight Institute in any way with regard to remote viewing targeting.
We showed it to Mr. Bell and Mr. Strieber primarily to assist our radio presentation, which in turn was primarily motivated to help Mr. Shramek. The photo was never intended to offer "solid physical proof" of the existence of the object. It was, minimally, another picture of the comet and its companion, and it reflected our efforts to try to obtain physical confirmation of our remote viewing results.
Following this radio broadcast, a huge public interest in the "mystery astronomer" developed, in large part stoked by comments that continued to be made on the radio about the picture. Finally, Art Bell announced that he would post the picture that was sent to him by us on his Web site. He did this, despite my strong objections, in mid January.
Approximately 24 hours later, Mr. Bell called me and informed me that the photo that we had sent him was a fraud. He said that the picture was found (without the Hale-Bopp companion) on a Web site run by the University of Hawaii. An astronomer at that university apparently sent Mr. Bell a letter stating that he took the photo, and that it was later digitally modified to add the companion. The overall implication was that we had taken the Web image from the Hawaiian Web site and created a fraudulent image of the companion.
When I heard about this, I realized that I had made a very crucial error. I knew that we had an authentic astronomical image that was not stolen from the Hawaiian Web site. (Remember, I have held the negatives from which our image was obtained.) Moreover, I do not now, nor have I ever argued that the Hawaiian image is contrived, or that anyone at the University was knowingly involved in an effort to discredit me or The Farsight Institute.
Moreover, we have absolutely no evidence to suggest that the astronomer who gave us the original images knowingly assisted the attempt to attack us. Also, even if the images provided to us were doctored, this does not mean that our astronomer contact knew of this. It would be positively immoral to disclose this astronomer's identity if he himself were duped.
Those who have attacked us have resources that extend beyond those of any university or professor. Yes, there are questions. But I do not have the resources to answer these questions in a way that will be meaningful to the public and the larger mission of The Farsight Institute. We were fed an image that someone knew would be attacked if ever released. That much we do know.
But the mistake that I made was in trying to combat a wide-scale and highly organized disinformation campaign using only physical evidence (e.g., a photo). The result was that I walked right into a trap. I am glad, in retrospect, to have done so, for I have re learned a great deal about what we need to be doing, and what we should not be doing, at The Farsight Institute. Moreover, this lesson has relevance to all interested individuals and groups across this entire planet.
Disinformation campaigns are not unusual in the area of extraterrestrial life. There are many powers-that-be that absolutely do not want this information to be widely accepted in the general populace at the current time. The magnitude of the disinformation campaign has been escalating ever since the Roswell UFO crash, and it certainly continues to this day.
Friends, it was foolish of me to think that we at The Farsight Institute could hope to combat an entrenched and continuing disinformation campaign on the basis of physical evidence. Physical evidence has never been the problem; the problem has always been that people are too willing to disregard almost any evidence based on nearly any contrary argument. In our case, an image nearly identical to our own was found in record time on a prominent university's Web site.
What should we do? Many of you may think that we should continue to combat this on the physical level. You may think that we should try to prove that our image came from film, and that this image was taken from a telescope, not another Web site. But friends, while all these facts are true, any effort to "prove" this would not succeed.
We know that we have never deceived or lied to the public. But we need to be very careful in how we respond to what has happened to us. If we try to respond on the level of only physical evidence, we will be crushed, not because we are wrong, but because we do not have the resources to win such a battle compared with those who attack us. The attacks would continue, and they would get worse in unexpected ways. It simply is not possible for us to fight our fight on that level.
We now want everyone to realize that we erred by fighting, even momentarily, on the level of the display of physical evidence. We are sorry for having done this. We apologize to those who have supported us for having strayed from our mission. But in the end, we want to emphasize to all of you how inconsequential all of this is in the larger picture of things.
At the current time, everyone is focusing on the photo, a photo that was never used by us for remote viewing targeting. This misses the point of all that we do and is ultimately not important. We need to remind everyone that our job at The Farsight Institute is to demonstrate scientifically to all of us that we humans are more than our physical bodies, and that life exists on both the physical and subspace (nonphysical) realms.
Focusing on the photo plays right into the hands of those who want to hinder widespread acknowledgment of our current condition, as well as our current potential as a species living in a galaxy that is literally full of life.
We all need to move to a higher level of awareness. We all need to act from within that higher level. In order for us to be successful, we simply cannot continue to act solely on the lower level of physical manifestation. Indeed, if the extraterrestrials wanted to force the issue of humanity accepting the existence of extraterrestrial life, they could simply move one of their large ships into an Earth orbit and leave it there. The reality is that they are using this cat and mouse, appearance and disappearance game to help us move to that higher level of awareness ourselves, without the need for such psychological force.
Many people think that they know what they themselves need with regard to scientific evidence that we live not alone in our universe. But again, the absence of such proof has never been the problem, and thus, the perceived need is simply incorrect. In our view, what people really need is the truth about who we are as humans.
People need to know about the new scientific understanding of our composite nature (two things put together, soul and body). Finally, people need to know that The Farsight Institute is dedicated to researching and teaching about our essential nature on the level of explorations into consciousness.
One day, the disinformation campaigns that reside on the physical level will cease. The attacks will come to an end, and we will all realize that these very attacks were a deep psychological response to the sense of change that is upon us. Indeed, these attacks reveal a profound level of stress in the collective consciousness of our human society.
We are at a turning point in our human evolution. We must all realize that no one should ever expect our efforts at The Farsight Institute to devolve to the level of a detective agency that seeks and presents only physical evidence. We collect and present data obtained using scientific remote viewing protocols.
We demand great accuracy of ourselves. We seek to demonstrate and continually improve our work. It is my view that the entire world will soon look objectively at what we do. Finally, one day nearly everyone will recognize that the great debate as to who we are and why we exist has been significantly resolved. This, indeed, is our mission.
A carpenter uses chisels and hammers. A plumber uses wrenches and torches. Cameras and telescopes are also good tools, but they are not our tools. Our tools that we use to accomplish our mission are the tools of consciousness. It was my mistake that we strayed from the use of solely these tools. I will not make that mistake again.
The stakes are high for all of humanity. We simply cannot fail in this effort to raise our own awareness of who we are. Never ask more than that we use our tools well. And we will never ask less of ourselves.
Sincerely,
Courtney Brown, Ph.D.
President
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