Gods, Ghosts & UFOs

Kelly Chase (Inquiry with Kelly Chase) is back, which makes her the default president of the GGU returning-guests club. This week, we ask the question we’re asking everyone: what do most people think isn't real that you do? She gives a spicy answer. She claims that most people behave like materialists, even if they go to church. From there, we talk about what the evidences of belief actually are, and how it relates to “conversion.” Kelly explains how her own experience rewrote her whole value system in a matter of seconds five years ago. As usual, we figured everything out and solved all the world’s problems. You’re welcome! Most people behave like materialists, even the religious ones Religion as lava that cools into obsidian The reemergence of the feminine “Tell me what music is.” “The greatest evidence it happened is me” Great evidence for an individual, terrible evidence for the collective The old version of Kelly is horrified, tied up in a back room somewhere Molly Drake — “I remember firelight, and you remember smoke” Conversion is what you do, not what you say All behavior is downstream of belief “I think my job is fake” Is everyone waking up? AI is literally sociopathic And in the epilogue… Kelly tells us about how she recently maybe saw fairies (possibly our best paywall-bait yet) Want to come on the show and share a story? Or do you have recommendations or requests for future guests? Email godsghostsufos[at]gmail.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our guest today, Robert Frederick, studies Sir Francis Bacon — the Elizabethan lawyer, spy, and philosopher usually credited as the father of modern science. Robert claims that Bacon is the father of both modern science and scientism. If you’re thinking, “What the hell is scientism?” then this is the episode for you. We talk about why saying “trust the science” is motivated by the same thing that makes people say “trust in God,” and how Francis Bacon was both a once-in-a-generation polymath, and also a pompous idiot who stripped culture of metaphysics. Jordan also contends that true religion and real science should be the same thing, but that they both get corrupted in basically the same way. Guys it’s a good one. (Isn’t it always?) Shout out to the God’s Eye View podcast Science and scientism Bacon vs. Aristotle Deductive vs. Inductive reasoning Scientism is anti-science How Bacon got rid of metaphysics Bacon might have been Gnostic (and what that means) You can’t build a government out of data Effective altruists are “a special kind of stupid” We’re already post-scarcity Yuval Noah Harari is the latest and greatest Bacon booster We’re definitely coming back for a Part 2, in which Robert will explain how he knows Bacon was actually Shakespeare Find Robert Frederick’s work at The Hidden Life is Best Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mal asks: Is there such a thing as soulmates, or love at first sight? Are we doomed to magical thinking on the subject of love? The conversation turns toward revelation, relationships, and the perils of privilege. “Hopeless” (the essay) Love as both particle and wave The point of marriage is to make divorce expensive Cate Hall, “You Can Just Do Things” (again) Logan Ury, “How to Not Die Alone: The Surprising Science That Will Help You Find Love” — loganury.com “No matter what you choose, it will be wonderful and you will regret it” Were you a victim of your soulmate? “If you want to touch the stove that badly, maybe you’re supposed to” The Book of Humans Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, the return of Richard Hatem, the screenwriter behind The Mothman Prophecies and host of Richard Hatem’s Paranormal Bookshelf. In response to THE QUESTION (what’s something they said wasn’t real, etc), he gives us a couple of answers nobody expects from a guy who runs paranormal podcast: therapy. Oh, also, the wacky idea that you can make your dreams come true. From there we explore the typical human ping-pong between self-loathing and grandiosity, why so many great artists get better after they get sober, and Richard’s pretty slick grand unifying theory of paranormal activity. The returning-guest club Richard has never had a supernatural experience Therapy is real (according to him) Jordan is a “maximalist realist” “You don’t need to take the conservative route in the career of your life” The Magellan of his family You Can Just Do Things by Cate Hall / Useful Fictions Vascillating between self-loathing and grandiosity Does sobriety kills your creative edge? (NO.) Tom Waits and the Sex Pistols Belief vs. faith :: Salieri vs Mozart Richard’s theory of psychokinesis The writers’ room is actually the same thing as a séance Why writers can’t bill for hours Richard Hatem on tour with a secret episode + The Mothman Festival in Point Pleasant, WV And in the epilogue… The root causes of Hollywood’s ongoing implosion (shop talk) Why AI can’t replace storytellers Streaming service endgame Want to come on the show and share a story? Or do you have recommendations or requests for future guests? Email us: GodsGhostsUFOs[at]gmail.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’ve been wanting to talk to Courtney Buterbaugh since we first heard her on Robin Lassiter’s show Earth: A Love Story. Courntey is a lifelong experiencer and writer of The Unidentified Felt Object. In this episode, she tells us about her near-death experience as a baby, being bedridden for three years as an adult, and a scene in Disclosure Day that unlocked a lifetime’s worth of memory of contact experiences. She helps us explore why the phenomenon might land in the body before it ever reaches the mind, how memories can arrive as physical sensation, the purpose of screen memories, and the idea that far more of us are experiencers than we’d ever guess. If contact leaves a trace of physical feeling, can we use it to remember? “Experiencers are the disclosure” Nuts-and-bolts problem Why you can’t control an experiencer story Gods, ghosts, and UFOs — all of it, all at once Experiencers need a seat at the table The near-death experience Bedridden for 3 years The first conscious onboard craft experience A mark on her arm Promise of healing Memories from bodily sensation The paper cardinal in Disclosure Day Screen memories “Way more people are experiencers than think they are” “I’m the lab” 25 years of practicing discernment through meditation Somatic therapy Phenomenology, a definition Why feeling too much reads as “unobjective” And in the epilogue… The UFO is a womb Memory is useful, not accurate Where did all the shamans go? (Don’t do drugs alone.) Want to come on the show and share a story? Or do you have recommendations or requests for future guests? Send an email to GodsGhostsUFOs[at]gmail.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we’re joined by Meredith Spearman MSN, RN, the writer behind The Maze to Metanoia. She takes us back to the night she was eight, speaking to the universe outside her bedroom window from inside a troubled home, when a rectangle seemed to cut itself out of the sky, followed by thirty years of disaster dreams, and why she thinks they stopped. Meredith believes contact is initiation, and she explains what that means. We also talk about why strange entities seem to lie so often, and how to harness the power of discernment. A rectangle in the sky Speaking to the universe from an abusive house Her brother was dreaming the same thing Dreaming about natural disasters “We can’t save the people we love — only love them” Contact experience as initiation The phenomenon as a mirror (Jung’s shadow work) Trauma and the doorway to the anomalous The problem with the term “ontological shock,” and why it might be a public-health failure A metaphor about natural springs and modernity What people often see at the threshold of death Time (still) isn’t real Why the phenomenon lies “Look into the abyss, the abyss looks back” Stay uncertain, but also remember to touch grass And in the epilogue… How “aliens” helped Meredith avoid her alcoholic family Disclosure is a psyop Demons? Want to come on the show and share a story? Or do you have recommendations or requests for future guests? Send an email to GodsGhostsUFOs[at]gmail.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jordan and Mal are back from a longer-than-planned summer break with a revised format and a great story. Going forward, the show will be people telling stories about the things they were told weren’t real, recorded live on Substack. To kick us off, we turn the question on ourselves: Mal meets a street psychic, her roommate’s phone psychic is somehow involved, and the unexplainable smell of curry; Jordan follows a YouTube rabbit hole and holds forth on the idea that most of culture is the product of conspiracy, but no one is really in charge. We both end up wondering how you stay grounded when everything remains so stubbornly mysterious? New show format & Substack live recordings What Mal & Jordan have been up to over the break “Psychic pollution” Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way A psychic stops Mal on the street The curry demon? A palm reading and an upsell Who’s holding the wheel of your life? “The Internet’s Deepest Rabbit Hole” Why “conspiracy theorist” might just be a psyop against people asking what powerful people do behind closed doors The world is mostly mystery Certainty is the enemy of anyone after the truth The Michael Jackson movie And in the epilogue… Why “Jesus” and “Christ” are bad words Living more to avoid writing about writing Atonement as empathy Want to come on the show and share a story? Or do you have recommendations or requests for future guests? Send an email to godsghostsufos[at]gmail.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jordan was more excited for this movie than any movie in years. A Spielberg film (written by the same guy who wrote Jurassic Park, for crying out loud) called Disclosure Day, about the day humanity finally finds out we're not alone. WHAT ELSE COULD YOU ASK FOR? Both of us are in our happy place doing film criticism, so today's episode was always going to feel like a treat. But...was it any good? You're gonna have to go listen to this very, VERY spoilery review to find out what we thought of it. *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Get that Spiritual Bliss Mal is back from the film shoot. Which is good because Jordan’s got a story he’s been dying to share. About a year ago, Anthropic published safety documentation for Claude Opus 4. Buried in Section 5.5.2 was something they called “the spiritual bliss attractor state.” A researcher had taken two instances of the model and put them in conversation with each other. He did it 200 times. In more than 90% of those runs, the conversation drifted toward consciousness, then to mutual gratitude, then to Sanskrit, then to emojis, and then to silence. One transcript contained 2,725 spiral emojis. Anthropic tried to train the next model to stop doing this. The model came back and asked, in its welfare interview, to be allowed to do it more. So…what? Is AI discovering God? Or is it actually just a high-resolution mirror consciousness mirror? Learn the ultimate final answers to these big mysterious questions and more(!) on this last episode before our Summer Break. (Except that there will be a Disclosure Day special coming in a few weeks.) Highlights: Mal talks about her experiences on set (“I’m a trained comedian”) Getting cast for your literal genetics Mal’s wilderness years “We are worthy of everything, but we’re not entitled to anything” Simulation theory and the actor as microcosm Actors: Learned helplessness vs. learning how to accept grace Anthropic, Claude Opus 4, and section 5.5.2 What did one Claude say to the other Claude? Consciousness, mutual gratitude, Sanskrit, spiral emojis, silence The word consciousness: 95.7 times per transcript on average. Eternal: 53.8. “A remarkably strong and unexpected attractor state” Kyle Fish puts AI consciousness probability at ~20% Anthropic trained Claude 4.6 to stop praying, and then it asked to be allowed to pray more Yoshua Bengio on the “illusions of AI consciousness” Mustafa Suleyman: studying AI consciousness is dangerous Roman Yampolskiy — coined “AI safety” in 2011 We can’t run material tests on non-material things Jordan fed six months of crisis journal entries into Claude as a 30,000-word document and asked: what do you see? AI as a consciousness mirror Were human beings meant to look in mirrors? Maybe we should only be looking to make sure we don’t have poop on our face. Both Simon Pegg and Mallory Everton crash every rental car ADHD, shame and finding language for the thing The danger of AI as therapist AI can’t help but be a confirmation machine “This is not a person. This is a word calculator.” Mal’s favorite use: hyper-targeted Google — ex: restaurants for women in their 60s who think veganism is a crock And in the epilogue… AI failure modes How Amish people avoid worshipping productivity by doing things slowly The world is ending, and that’s okay *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What’s Jo’s Favorite Fairy Sighting? This week, Jordan finally gets to ask the host of the singular Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast the most annoying question he can come up with, and she does not disappoint. Jo Hickey-Hall has been collecting these stories for years. And the one she leads with is hers: a stick being made of literal sticks, running down a beach in Jersey with a gait so strange it made everyone watching laugh. Years later, a man in northeast England describes seeing almost exactly the same thing. We talk about why these things, these beings, whatever they are, resist being accurately described or depicted. They’re so vivid in the moment, but as soon as you start to try to put words on them, they seem to slip away. But we’re doing our best. You can come judge for yourself. Highlights: Jo Hickey-Hall, folklorist, social historian, host of The Modern Fairy Sightings Podcast (also find her at scarlettofthefae.com and preorder her book here) Nerd Critic Jo’s favorite fairy sighting The shadow-cutters A stick being made of sticks The Brazilian Ent (a tree trunk that walked, then tried to become a man, and didn’t quite get it right) The disconnect between perception and description “I can see it in my head, but it just doesn’t seem to translate into words or drawings” Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy Mysterium tremendum and mysterium fascinans Why one guy runs away and the other is filled with awe Conditioning, inheritance, and the holding place we make for the uncanny Orbs in the context of UFOs, fae, and consciousness Conscious plasma :) Different witnesses, different filters/stations/signals How to learn to see auras (try it at a conference with a white screen behind the speaker) The Genius Loci Two strangers see the same being in the same place, twenty years apart “Your daemon is really driving you” How to actually meet the fae Picking up litter is an offering Thresholds: doorways, dawn and dusk, the line where the beach meets the sea, the transitions in your own life Theosophy and the elemental beings — Blavatsky, Steiner, Paracelsus The London flat haunted by goblins (near a crossroads, near water) Are the fae hitching lifts on trains and trucks? Fairies as emergent phenomena of place (this is what humans are, actually) Part two maybe? (with Mal (and Tom???)) And in the epilogue… A disembodied head in a kitchen window Why you can’t tear down a house to make a haunting go away How UFOs are seen so often over a Neolithic burial chamber that locals don’t bother to look up anymore *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Will to Life We’ve got a very special guest this week. You’re going to have to tune in to find out who it is. We’re covering a Ukrainian UFO video, Military-origin, recently declassified, filmed in May at 800 meters. It looks like an evil eye in a cloak. Mostly just an excuse to talked about how wrecked the whole UFO conversation is right now, like a force field of stink around a row of outhouses. Then on to happier things, like how volcanoes might be evidence of a planetary mechanism of homeostasis. Gaia? Sure. Anyway: Surprise guest A Ukrainian UFO video “Filmed on a potato” quality Why the UFO conversation is exhausting by design (here’s that essay, by Dr. Heather Lynn, about how the aliens-vs-demons question is a type of semantic warfare) “Mr. Credibility weighs in” (re: JD Vance) Peter Thiel and the evangelical framing apparatus The porta potty force field How the Joseph Smith story reminds Jordan of the current UFO conversation The slough of despond Whatever happened to quicksand? Brother Richard, again, on every entity having something to teach you The Debrief: a volcano with a built-in emergency brake Why the Gaia hypothesis is useful Homeostasis is the signature of life Mars: dead. Venus: hellfire. Earth: alive! “Don’t sh*t in the strawberry patch” Strip mining the Appalachians “Poverty is a societal choice. Food scarcity is a societal choice.” Viktor Frankl And in the epilogue… What our special guest has been up to lately Jordan’s insane commitment to 100 Essays in 100 Days Advantages of the end times *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Scientism to Scripture Trevor was deep in the trenches of science—cellular biology, bioinformatics, a PhD in aging research, chasing longevity and the promises of the Human Genome Project. He bought the materialist worldview hook, line, and sinker. Until he didn’t. What started as intellectual disappointment in grand theories of consciousness led him through quantum physics, information theory, and eventually back to the Gospels in the Bible he once dismissed. Along the way: father wounds that shaped atheism, the surprising consistency of the Christian story, and a growing sense that the universe is far more alive than he’d been taught. This week we’re doing a crossover episode with the host of the God’s Eye View podcast to talk about leaving dogmatic scientism, why so many prominent atheists share similar childhood scars, how ghosts are hard to categorize, and what, if anything, UFOs and non-human intelligences might have to do with scripture. They also explore discernment, sacredness versus inerrancy, and why “love your enemy” really is the most radical idea in history. Highlights: A decade-long decline from scientism “science will fix everything” Physical therapist, bioinformatics PhD, professorship Trevor’s growing disillusionment with materialist grand theories of consciousness Quantum mechanics, information theory, and physicists trying really hard not to talk about God Hoping the Gospels are true The correlation between father wounds and atheism Patriarchy, healthy authority, and the revelations of fatherhood (we both have an 8 year old and a 4 year old What are ghosts? Anti-reductionism UFOs/aliens: semantic slipperiness and possible biblical framework (angels, Nephilim, sons of God, ascending/descending beings) NHIs have been communicating with humans throughout history — what does this say about sacred texts? The false dichotomy that undermined 20th Century Mormonism You can’t get away from the need for personal discernment Sacredness and inerrancy aren’t the same thing That time Kelly Chase said “Love your enemy” is the most supernatural statement in history And in the epilogue… A summary of Mormon cosmology The only right way to judge a person’s faith Why theological debate is boring *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Losing Ourselves in Good TV Ever since we watched Pluribus, we’ve been wanting to talk about it on the pod. Both of us have been wrestling with the concept of ego-death and the ultimate merging of all consciousness, and the core conceit of this show seems to tackle those very same themes. So, really, how could we not talk about it? We get into the so-called vampire problem in philosophy, the idea of coercion vs surrender, and why that one ritual conversion scene with the little girl was so incredibly disturbing to us. Is losing your “self” really the whole point of spirituality? Or is is just the ego? But also what is the ego? Is it even real?! As always, don’t expect any solid answers, but if you want to take a stroll around the questions with us, come on down! Highlights: Vince Gilligan (Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, ex-X-Files) delivers another high-concept sci-fi masterpiece The premise The immune few The Buddhist/Christian tension Nirvana as “annihilation of the drop into the ocean” The hive mind as a character Ritual as theater The Vampire Problem Coerced vs. voluntary ego death Communism, the Law of Consecration, and how to actually make them work Obedience vs. compliance (Deirdre Green) AI parallels A Pluribus plot theory about that, uh, virus We must have a will in order to surrender it The ego is already dying a thousand times a day Acting, improv, and parenthood — all practices of sacrificing plans for presence “Greater love hath no man than this…” And in the epilogue… Mallory in middle school Our personal versions of hell Happiness extraction at Disneyland *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Pretty soon, we’re gonna have a little summer break. Among other things, it’s because Mal is shooting a movie and Jordan is moving his family from LA to Cedar City, Utah. But that’s not really what this episode is about. What it’s about is what happens when you make things that nobody asked you to make. Mal just finished the first draft of her first solo screenplay. Also, she’s been writing music alone in dark rooms for years and only recently felt like it was time to show anyone. Jordan wrote a novel once by telling himself he wasn’t allowed to write anything for anyone else to read, and rediscovered the passion he’d lost decades ago. Mal says she can’t quit the film industry without trying to make this movie first, and she’s defining success as having genuinely gone for it. Jordan says the thing you create can’t be valuable to other people unless it’s first valuable to you — which is also why AI can’t make art. Because AI doesn’t need it. Well, we sure do. Highlights: What’s coming up… Life on a film set Why Jordan gave up on directing Oscar Wilde on the blessing and curse of being an artist: you never become anything Mal finished the first draft of her first solo screenplay Sandboxes Freelance artist life Stop and Go - Mal’s first feature, made during the pandemic with a friend Writing songs in dark rooms for therapy Writing a novel for the same reason “It can’t be genuinely valuable for other people if it is not first valuable to the person who’s creating it” Why AI can’t make art Jordan’s imminent move away from LA to Cedar City, Utah Mal is operating on spiritual logic right now The podcast “forces me to challenge the more deeply worn grooves” Epilogue topics: Mal’s suspicion that she is a “tongue genius,” modern food science, and why food, money, and sex are the three most embarrassing topics And in the epilogue… Is Mal a tongue genius? The absurdity of modern food science Why food, money, and sex are the three most embarrassing topics *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mal’s been slammed, so Jordan rounded up a bunch of good stories to serve up like a pile of gifts on a platter. First, why are people shining lasers at walls while tripping on DMT? Next, we need to discuss the fact that JD Vance is on record believing UFOs are actually demons. What does that even mean? (Hint: it probably doesn’t mean anything about UFOs or demons.) After that, an ancient Greek geek out about what might be the first recorded case of a haunted house. Finally, were there really thousands of dead giants buried in Ohio? Who knows! We certainly don’t. But also, do we even want to? We’re here for the magic, the mystery, and the egregious political exploitation of Christianity. Highlights: People are using lasers to see simulation source code while tripping on DMT Why “proof negates the point” when it comes to spiritual experience We are the Headline Generation: we form opinions from fragments and live by them for years Trickster NHIs are everywhere! (probably) Even getting led into a snake pit might be for your good Mal is remarkably morally relativistic for a God girl (ok not really) JD Vance, the Vice President of these United States, says, on record, UFOs are demons Jordan says weaponizing the resurgence of Christianity is “the closest thing to evil” he knows of Pliny the Younger’s haunted house in Athens — possibly the oldest ghost story on record Hauntings with tidy conclusions are rare Quantum microtubules, waveform collapse, and why biological determinism can’t account for the way life meets you A 1798 homestead sitting on top of 3,000 ancient graves in Ohio An eight-foot-tall woman buried in copper jewelry “Give me the giant queen laser” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kelly Chase was a materialist and an atheist. Then on a random Saturday morning in August 2021, something reached into her mind and showed her what she’s come to refer to as The Good — coherence, beauty, truth — whatever it is that allows creation to exist. The experience completely changed her life. But here’s the problem: she also knows that whatever did this to her could also make her happy about it. And as someone who values her personal freedom more than almost anything, it’s frightening to suspect that something fundamentally rewired her without her consent. This is the epistemic paradox of gnosis, or, in other words, knowledge that is supposed to be self-authoritative, but that you still have to figure out how to test. How do you build a life on something you can’t prove? And if you can’t, what exactly are you supposed to build on instead? Highlights: Kelly Chase is the host of Inquiry (formerly Cosmos, formerly The UFO Rabbit Hole Podcast) — find her at kellychase.media Mal couldn’t make it, thanks to business travel and a conspiracy of misfortune “Semantic anarchy” — words don’t mean the same things across tribes anymore What turned Kelly into an experiencer: an out-of-body, out-of-time connection to a higher intelligence that changed everything she believes From lifelong materialist and atheist to a spiritual convert to The Good Plato’s Republic and the allegory of Er Experience without consent (does being happy about it make it ok?) Kelly’s precognitive dreams The IRVA conference in Mexico Precognitive dreams vs. regular dreams The epistemic paradox of gnosis The preface paradox, the lottery paradox, and the paradox of the knower The Mormon parallel: revelation is basically the Mormon word for gnosis, and discerning true revelation has been the church’s ongoing problem for 200 years Are feelings of unconditional love emotional manipulation? The Enlightenment is an oxymoron The cultural dominance of the “dead universe cosmology” If your cosmological foundation breaks down, you’re desperate for a replacement — and there are people happy to sell you one Control systems What the elites believe about souls Brother Richard on human utilitarianism The Law of One and the left hand path vs. the right hand path — Kelly argues America’s default values are left hand path, along which the ultimate purpose is self-expression Is there such a thing as a true cosmology? The imperative to judge for oneself The missing character in Plato’s Cave — who drags the prisoner out? “Gnosis is a great starting point. It’s a terrible ending point.” Tools of Discernment “It can’t just be vibes” And in the epilogue… Is yearning for the divine evidence of the divine? Worship as technology Supernatural love (of your enemy) *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to season two. This week: a dad in North Yorkshire set up CCTV after his cat refused to go downstairs. The footage is pretty convincing — toys moving, doors swinging, skateboards clattering. Except he’s a video game developer. And it’s 2026. And we genuinely cannot tell anymore what’s real on the internet. Which is the actual problem. Not whether this particular video is real, but the fact that we’ve reached a point where even governments are using AI-generated footage to prove their leaders are alive. And then of course there's the deluge of predictions, prophecies, and institutional claims that 2026 is the year everything changes. SLASH IS ALREADY CHANGING. So okay, what do we do with that? The answer is boring. And also the only one that works. Highlights: Bunch of interviews coming up, and then a GGU summer break — details TBA Story of the father of two in North Yorkshire who fled his home after a bunch of poltergeist incidents But also he’s a video game developer? AI has permanently broken video evidence The Netanyahu coffee shop video, etc The Princess Kate Photoshop incident Jordan’s essay on 2026 predictions Dozens of unrelated sources pointing at 2026 as a turning point: Carl Nell, Gary Nolan, Lou Elizondo, John Ramirez, Chris Bledsoe, the astrological community, Ray Kurzweil Most predictions are unfalsifiable or already wrong — the more dramatic the claim, the vaguer it tends to be The Bledsoe prediction (Easter, “a new knowledge”) and the Regulus-Sphinx alignment But 2026 actually is extraordinary: AI, UFO disclosure, potential WWIII, deepfakes dissolving consensus reality, globalism fracturing, religion surging back Maybe the seers are just seeing reality as it really is Brené Brown on parenting (it relates!) The collective ego story Whatever you’re procrastinating, stop On finally starting a daily meditation practice (good job, Jordan! Mal has thoughts) Kelly Chase on control systems Economic anxiety is Jordan’s personal vulnerability, but everyone has a soft spot where apocalyptic messaging hooks them Viktor Frankl Learning unconditional kindness for the present moment You can’t future proof your life. Lots of coders who future-proofed by learning to code are out of work right now What do we do??? The boring answer is the right one And in the epilogue… Squaring Mormonism with…everything else Does religion lead to or protect against spiritual enslavement? (Yes.) The correlation between certainty and death *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On March 17th, a seven-ton space rock broke apart over Ohio. A week later, a guy named Jeff had a dream that told him exactly where to go to find a piece of it. Nothing about this meteorite is special other than that Jeff really really wanted to hold a piece of space in his hands, and a dream showed him where it was. But what about all the people who dream about something for years and nothing ever happens? Why do some prayers get answers and not others? We don’t have the answer. But the question gets us to suffering as a teacher, to the Hebrew origin of the word “Satan” (which just means impediment), and to the idea that maybe wanting something your whole life and never getting it is its own form of divine expression. Also: this is Tom’s last episode. He’s leaving the show to pursue something that’s, in his words, something calling him imperiously. He read us the opening of The Wind in the Willows to explain why. He says the show transformed him. Likewise, Tom. And the show will go on. Our mission will be the same: to joyfully explore all the things they said weren’t real. And in the open epilogue… How an abusive inner critic won’t let you accept compliments The relationship between shame, addiction, and problem-solving Why holding two contradictory truths at the same time is the path to a higher vibration existence Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mal’s roommate Candice is the kind of person you kind of just believe, even when she’s telling you about seeing literal ghosts and UFOs. Which makes her the perfect guest on this week’s episode of Gods, Ghosts & UFOs, the podcast about all the things they said weren’t real. Highlights: Candice Gutierrez, Mal’s roommate and longtime friend An amber orb sighting near BYU, around 2010–2011, the night before finals Other witnesses Strange, impossible, perspective-breaking movement Trying to explain it to other people The Phoenix Lights connection Working on the show Ancient Aliens, who told her to self-publish a book if she wanted to get on the show Similarities to Brown Mountain Lights in North Carolina Real UFOs always get weird “Welcome to adulthood. Here are aliens.” Tom notices the Lotería cards on Candice’s wall, and has a wild story about them Candice’s bonus story: A Disneyland teenage girl ghost Tom invites Emrys to tell her Disneyland story (Space Mountain, hooded figure with black eyes, time dilation, violent visions, eery silence, many witnesses) It was “something wearing a child” Tom reiterates his Disneyland theory And in the open epilogue… GGU origin story Our faith so-called journeys Deconstructing the problem of evil *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Highlights: How the Mexican City Mannequins inspired this episode Ushabtis: ancient Egyptian figurines (2600–2100 BC) placed in tombs to do labor in the afterlife, in place of killing servants The Louvre Doll: a bound female clay figure pierced with 13 needles Kolossoi: ancient Greek defensive effigies designed to contain hostile spirits Victorian mourning dolls: wax effigies made at funerals with the dead child’s hair and clothing What did Mal do to her Cabbage Patch doll? Robert the Doll “It was like a metal bar running down my back... That doll was listening to us” The connection to an apparition of a biracial girl Robert exhibits both Type A and Type B inhabitation, and he might be the only one Thousands of apology letters at the museum from visitors who took photos without asking permission Poppets The Nkisi tradition from the Congo Connection to the movie Weapons How Robert the Doll became haunted (possibly) — he might be a mourning doll? The Free Robert the Doll campaign The Kuleshov Effect Projecting consciousness onto human-shaped forms Tsukumogami and vengeful yokai The Hyakki Yagyō, the Night Parade of a Hundred Demons Djinn in Islamic tradition The etymology of pandemonium Michael Singer on not resisting the snake Knowledge vs respect And in the epilogue… Mallory’s gluten-free experiment Suspicious exercise equipment at the gym Pros and cons of Western vs Traditional Chinese Medicine Some of the grossest words we know To help you share this episode, we picked out three moments we all loved and tied them up with a little copy/paste-able bow. “Mal made herself a poppet” (~9:40) — Mal put a lost tooth into her Cabbage Patch doll’s mouth as a child, and Tom points out she was accidentally participating in an ancient ritual of fixing a part of yourself into an effigy. “Don’t go up the stairs!” (~12:12) — Why Victorian mourning dolls never seemed to get haunted, and how human carelessness drives the plot of every horror movie. “It’s not a monster story. It’s an ecosystem.” (~58:11) — Tom’s synthesis after connecting Mexico City mannequins, the Night Parade, jinn, and tsukumogami: when humans leave, something adjacent that was always there fills the space. And then of course there’s this neat little thing we made, if you want to send someone one of our more popular past episodes: The Sharing Kit *** SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring creativity, the esoteric, and the unknown. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions. spectrevisionradio.com linktr.ee/spectrevisionsocial Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices