Charles Fort was an American researcher from the early twentieth century who cataloged reports of unexplained phenomena he found in newspapers and science journals. A minor bestseller with a cult appeal, Fort's work was posthumously republished in the pulp science fiction magazine Astounding Stories in 1934. His idiosyncratic books fascinated, scared, and entertained readers, many of them authors and editors of science fiction. Fort's work prophesied the paranormal mainstays of SF literature to come: UFOs, poltergeists, strange disappearances, cryptids, ancient mysteries, unexplained natural phenomena, and everything in between. Science fiction authors latched on to Fort's topics and hypotheses as perfect fodder for SF stories. Writers like Arthur C. Clarke, Philip K. Dick, Robert Heinlein, H.P. Lovecraft, and others are examined in this exploration of Fortean science fiction--a genre that borrows from the reports and ideas of Fort and others who saw the possible science-fictional nature of our reality.

A prescient warning of a future we now inhabit, where fake news stories and Internet conspiracy theories play to a disaffected American populace “A glorious book . . . A spirited defense of science . . . From the first page to the last, this book is a manifesto for clear thought.”—Los Angeles Times How can we make intelligent decisions about our increasingly technology-driven lives if we don’t understand the difference between the myths of pseudoscience and the testable hypotheses of science? Pulitzer Prize-winning author and distinguished astronomer Carl Sagan argues that scientific thinking is critical not only to the pursuit of truth but to the very well-being of our democratic institutions. Casting a wide net through history and culture, Sagan examines and authoritatively debunks such celebrated fallacies of the past as witchcraft, faith healing, demons, and UFOs. And yet, disturbingly, in today's so-called information age, pseudoscience is burgeoning with stories of alien abduction, channeling past lives, and communal hallucinations commanding growing attention and respect. As Sagan demonstrates with lucid eloquence, the siren song of unreason is not just a cultural wrong turn but a dangerous plunge into darkness that threatens our most basic freedoms. Praise for The Demon-Haunted World “Powerful . . . A stirring defense of informed rationality. . . Rich in surprising information and beautiful writing.”—The Washington Post Book World “Compelling.”—USA Today “A clear vision of what good science means and why it makes a difference. . . . A testimonial to the power of science and a warning of the dangers of unrestrained credulity.”—The Sciences “Passionate.”—San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle

“The Universal Mind: The Evolution of Machine Intelligence and Human Psychology” There is the perception of being totally omniscient where one has access to all knowledge having a complete understanding of everything. There is also the perception of being totally “One with the Universe”, "One with Nature" or "the Universal Mind". During this time one is also experiencing the feeling of total love, acceptance and peace. This book examines the relationship of mind as intelligence and consciousness to matter-energy and space-time. The concepts of Universal Mind or Collective Unconsciousness are discussed and related to physical phenomena such as the holographic distribution of information throughout all of space and the universe. From the paintings of Salvador Dalí to Carl Jung’s Archetypes and his Red Book, and how they describe our collective subconscious, to Machine Learning and Whole Genome Sequencing. The Universal Mind explores the collective world consciousness, super-intelligence, machine intelligence and the practical applications in engineering, medicine, law, and politics. 537 Pages. Tags: Philosophy, Computer Science, Collective Consciousness, Artificial Intelligence, Technological Singularity, Analytical Psychology.

Robert Anton Wilson's final book explores the "relativity of reality" in a mind-bending stream of essays. Among other topics, the master of guerrilla ontology examines The Celtic Roots Of Quantum Theory, Schrödinger's Other Cat, Joyce & Daoism, Sexual Alchemy, Left and Right: A Non-Euclidean Perspective, and Cheerful Reflections On Death And Dying. RAW's description of his run for Governor of California as the candidate for his Guns & Dope Party offers a delightfully absurd view of an improbable Maybe in terrestrial politics. "I wrote these polemics, poems, neurolinguistic experiments and assorted meanderings over a period of about 45 years," and in reflecting on this extraordinary collection of his writings, the brilliant and modest Model Agnostic adds, "I don't believe anything, but I have many suspicions . . . These suspicions have grown over 72 years, but as a rather slow and stupid fellow I do not have the Chutzpah to proclaim any of them as certitudes." "A SUPER GENIUS . . . He has written everything I was afraid to write." - Dr. John Lilly, writer, neuroscientist and psychonaut "One of the leading thinkers of the modern age." - Barbara Marx Hubbard, Foundation for Conscious Evolution "A masterful satirist who views history as an open question." - Brad Linaweaver, Atlanta Constitution "I have learned more from Robert Anton Wilson than I have from any other source." - Comedian George Carlin

Why do nearly all the world's major religions share similar myths? Erich Von Däniken, author of the runaway international bestseller Chariots of the Gods, believes he knows: the winged deities populating ancient religious texts were in reality extraterrestrials. Fully illustrated with compelling color and black-and-white photographs, the book takes us from Myanmar to Peru's and Egypt's unexplained “landing strips.”