Yes, I certainly find wearing the rubber suit helps.

It’s an interesting topic for a sociologist/psychologist, maybe. For myself, it’s distasteful; smacks of going to the madhouse to watch the amusing antics of the inmates. Even if they like the attention, encouraging them to persist in it is not good for them or for society.

What you quoted is a perfect illustration of trying to stretch something that is known and understood around something that is not understood (and not caring if it is irresponsible or not). That kind of distortion doesn’t advance knowledge at all. That’s why I prefer skeptics like Chris French, who have the integrity to say where current theories come up short – so that further research could perhaps account for the differences, maybe discover something new. Notice I am not ruling out that it may be something similar – but you cannot just write off something similar as something identical and call it a day. Not when so much distortion is required to pull it off. If we did that, apples would be oranges.

‘A sensed presence, vague gibberish spoken in one’s ear, shadowy creatures moving about the room, a strange immobility, a crushing pressure and painful sensations in various parts of the body — these are compatible not just with an assault by a primitive demon but also with probing by alien experimenters,” Dr. Cheyne said. ”And the sensations of floating and flying account for the reports of levitation and transport to alien vessels.”

“A lot of times the experiences seem to begin in hypnagogic states,but that doesnt mean they are dream states, that would be a mistake [to assume that].” - Dr John Mack at Oberlin College, 2001

I once had a hypnopompic hallucination very similar to that — not an alien, but a ghostly-looking old man sitting at the foot of my bed. I have a very clear memory of staring at him and thinking “I don’t believe in ghosts, but I’ve been staring at this image for a long time and it hasn’t gone away or turned into a trick of the light. So maybe I was wrong and there are such things as ghosts. Best practice with ghosts is to ask them what they want.” (Seriously, that was my train of thought.)

So I opened my mouth and said “What –” and immediately the image disappeared. Speaking had clearly knocked my brain out of the hallucination.

Brains can do such weird things.

Oh.. and the mediating(?) time travelling einstein guy was high and might have gone to this thing just for something to do- probably works as a bus boy for the convention center.

I loved the photography though! Great light.