Aerial Phenomena: Reviving Ufology for the 21st Century by Antonio Paris – a book review by Michael Frawley
UFO. What does it mean? UFO stands for Unidentified Flying Objects. The key emphasis being on the word UNIDENTIFIED. But often people, including myself, have tied the acronym UFO to extraterrestrials. This is not the case as you will learn by reading Aerial Phenomena: Reviving Ufology for the 21st Century, written by Antonio Paris, founder of the Aerial Phenomenon Investigations Team, published in November 2012.
First a little about the author. Antonio Paris is a native New Yorker, from the city of New York, born and raised as well as attended college. From there he joined the military as an Army intelligence officer for two tours in Iraq. After his terms of service he decided that the Army was more of a chapter in his life. He then moved to WashingtonD.C. and became a special agent for the Department of Defense in counter intelligence for three of four years. He then decided that he could do the same thing for a consulting firm in the private industry. He has worked for the same defense contract company, called Booz Allen Hamilton, ever since. A current Maryland resident, he commutes to D.C. every day.
Will you find all sorts of fascinating stories about visitors from outer space in this book? The answer is no. What you will find is a break down of the investigative process using a ‘nuts and bolts’ (as the author is fond of saying) core method. That is, using scientific process to research and explain aerial phenomena sightings.
As Antonio explains, he and the API team are not out to debunk stories about unidentified flying objects or other aerial phenomena. Rather their goal is to inform, educate, research, and investigate credible sighting reports. This book breaks down the process from beginning to end of the investigative process that API uses to confirm or explain unusual reports.
Paris explains in his book what the investigative process is about, how the information is gathered, put to the test, and tools used when looking into these phenomena. The book also gives detailed accounts of specific reports that the team investigated first hand, noting the account of the witness or witnesses, processes that were deployed to re-create a phenomena, how the information was gathered, and conclusions that were drawn based on the information provided. Each case is noted as identified or unidentified based on the findings of each investigation. Some of the API’s cases remain unresolved. Many are resolved with a note as to how the phenomena actually occurred.
I’m not going to cite any of the details of these investigations from the book. After all, that’s why the book was written! Suffice to say that this book is not only a must read for the UFO investigator, but in my opinion, the methods devised by Antonio Paris and the API team apply to any investigation of the unexplained. I highly recommend this not only for UFO researchers, but for paranormal and monster researchers as well. Their scientific method can be applied to each field.
I find this to be a great book. For the experienced investigator it’s a good reference and reminder to stay grounded and look for the facts. For the enthusiast it’s a fun book of real life events and can help separate facts from fantasy. The API team is self funded and sales from the book go to fund the research, and field investigations that the Aerial Phenomenon Investigations Team conducts.
– Michael Frawley
Article at I Must be Hallucinating
We aren’t looking to become a very large organization in the foreseeable future, but we would like to add one more Field Investigator to our rolls at present. Of course, this is an unpaid volunteer position, but we also don’t charge membership dues. No experience is required.
