Déclaration de Hynek à l'ONU (1978)

J. Allen Hynek à la 33ème session de l'Assemblée Générale de l'ONU, sous les couleurs de La Grenade.

27 Novembre 1978.

M. le Président :

Je suis ravi d'avoir été invité par Sir Eric Gairy et la Mission de Grenade à parler à ce comité sur le sujet des Objets Volants Non Identifiés au nom de nombreux de mes collègues scientifiques. Il y a de nombreuses années, en conversation avec Son Excellence, U Thant, celui-ci m'informa que le protocole demandait qu'une nation membre commence par amener un sujet dans l'Assemblée Générale avant que toute action sur ce sujet puisse être initiée.

Aujourd'hui, de nombreuses années plus tard, une des plus petites nations sur Terre a courageusement introduit le sujet rendant perplexe des ovnis à l'Assemblée Générale, et ainsi rendu possible cette réunion aujourd'hui. Je recommande l'initiative que son excellence Sir Eric Gairy a prise ; il a posé le pied là ou des nations plus puissantes ont eu peur de s'engager.

M. le Président, il existe aujourd'hui un phénomène mondial... en fait s'il n'était pas mondial je ne m'adresserais pas à vous et à ces représentants de nombreuses parties du monde. Il existe un phénomène global dont le périmètre et l'étendue ne sont pas généralement reconnus. Il s'agit d'un phénomène si étrange et étranger à notre mode de pensée terrestre de tous les jours qu'il rencontre fréquemment le ridicule et la dérision de la part de personnes et organisations peu informées des faits. Encore et toujours, le phénomène persiste ; il ne s'est pas dissipé comme nombre d'entre nous auraient pensé qu'il le ferait lorsque, il y a des données, nous le considérions comme comme une lubie passante. Au lieu de cela, il a touché les vies d'un nombre croissant de personnes à travers le monde.

Je fait référence, bien sûr, au phénomène des ovnis... Objets Volants Non Identifiés... que j'aimerais ici définir simplement comme "toute observation aérienne ou de surface, ou enregistrement par instrument (e.g., radar, photographie, etc.) restant inexpliqué par des méthodes conventionnelles même après un examen compétent par des personnes qualifiées".

Vous noterez, M. le Président, que cette définition ne dit rien au sujet de petits hommes verts venant de l'espace, ou de manifestations de royaumes spirituels, ou de diverses manifestations psychiques. Il établit simplement une définition opérationnelle. Une erreur cardinale, et une source de grande confusion, ont été la substitution presque universelle d'une interprétation du phénomène ovni au phénomène lui-même.

C'est comme avoir décrit l'Aurore Boréale comme une communication angélique avant que nous comprenions la physique du vent solaire.

Néanmoins, dans l'esprit populaire le phénomène ovni est associé au concept d'intelligence extra-terrestre et cela pourrait encore se révéler correct dans certains contextes. Il est sûr que ce serait une énorme blague pour nous tous should it develop that evidence for extra-terrestrial intelligence was right here under our noses all the time while great effort was spent searching for it elsewhere!

Mais je répète et insiste, M. le Président, sur le fait que le phénomène global des signalements d'ovnis, signalements fréquemment faits par des personnes ayant de hautes responsabilités, n'est toujours compris. C'est encore un phénomène that has claimed the interest and attention of millions of people. In the United States alone, the Gallup Poll has not only shown a remarkably high awareness on the part of the public of the UFO subject, mais indique que 57 % de la population des U.S... soit bien au-delà d'une centaine de millions de personnes... pense que les ovnis sont réels et non un figment de l'imagination.

Les termes Soucoupes Volantes et OVNIs apparaissent aujourd'hui dans les dictionnaires de nombreux pays... un signe certain en soi de la conscience populaire. Ainsi nous avons les termes :

O.V.N.I. - Objetos Voladores Non ldentificados dans les pays latino-américains et l'Espagne, Soucoupe Volante en France, Fliegende Untertasen en Allemagne, Letaiici Talire en Tchèque et ainsi de suite dans une foule d'autres langues.

Le sujet est réellement dans l'esprit de nombreux peuples. En fait, d'après nos dossiers UFOCAT des signalements d'ovnis ont été rassemblés de 133 pays différents ! comme vous l'avez probablement déjà noté d'après les éléments qui vous ont été fournis.

Je dois ici souligner, M. le président, that were it so that these reports, albeit their global nature, were solely generated by irresponsible and ignorant persons, I should not be here this morning. Les faits sont bien autres : des signalements d'ovnis en nombres significatifs ont été faits par des personnes particulièrement responsables, to wit: astronautes, experts en radar, pilotes militaires et commerciaux... nombre, nombre d'entre eux... responsables de gouvernements, et scientifiques, même y compris des astronomes !

We have on record many tens of thousands of UFO reports. Even granting that by no means all of these are of high quality, they include extremely intriguing and provocative accounts of strange events experienced by highly reputable persons... events which challenge our present conception of the world about us and which may indeed signal a need for a change in some of these concepts... a point brought out some time ago in a radio broadcast to the French nation by the then Minister of Defense, M. Robert Galley, stressing the importance of investigating the truly unknown.

Dans une interview radio le 21 février 1974 il déclare :

"Je dois dire que si vous auditeurs pouvaient voir l'accumulation des renseignements venant de la gendarmerie de l'air, de la gendarmerie mobile, de la gendarmerie chargée des enquêtes territoriales qui ont été transmis au CNES par nos soins, c'est effectivement assez troublant. Ce que je crois, c'est que les gendarmes sont des gens sérieux. Les gendarmes, quand ils font un rapport, ne le font pas au hasard. S'il n'y en avait qu'un ou deux, on pourrait imaginer que leur bonne foi ait été surprise. Mais je dois dire qu'il y a tout de même un grand nombre de rapports de gendarmerie, qui sont très disparates. Tout ceci est assez fragmentaire encore. Je crois, pour conclure, que, dans cette affaire des ovnis, il faut adopter une attitude d'esprit extrêmement ouverte."

La plupart des données sur les ovnis sont "solides", pas nécessairement comme ce terme serai utilisé par un physicien, mais certainement "plus solides" que la plupart des données utilisées en sciences sociales et dans la pratique légale.

Peut-être les données les plus solides que nous possédions jusqu'ici sont celles que l'on appelle les Rencontre Rapprochées du 2nd Type, également connues comme les cas de Traces Physiques. These are the cases in which it is reported that concommittant and simultaneously with the occurence of a UFO event, there appears physical evidence of the immediate presence of the UFO. This can take the form of immediate physical effects on either animate or inanimate matter, or on both. Thus, physiological effects on humans and animals and plants have been very reliably reported, as have the interference with electrical systems in the immediate vicinity and the appearance of disturbed regions on the ground also in the immediate vicinity of the reported UFO event. Now over thirteen hundred physical trace cases are on record.

M. le président, tout phénomène qui touche les vies de tant de gens, et qui engendre puzzlement and even fear among them, is therefore not only of potential scientific interest and significance but also of sociological and political significance, especially since it carries with it many implications of the existence of intelligences other than our own. I will confine my remarks, however, to the scientific aspects of the subject. Le Dr. Vallée s'adressera plus directement, je pense, aux aspects sociologiques, and hence, likewise political aspects of the phenomenon.

Parlant alors pour moi-même en tant qu'astronome, et je pense également pour nombre de mes collègues, la question ne se pose plus dans mon esprit quant à l'importance de ce sujet. It is my considered opinion, based on many years of study, both as Scientific Consultant to the U.S. Air Force, and in recent years, as an involved scientist, that the UFO phenomenon whatever its origin may turn out to be, is eminently worthy of study.

And I am by no means alone in this opinion. There is today a growing community of scientists, from many countries, who have declared an interest, either privately or openly, in pursuing the challenge presented by the UFO problem, and who are gathering and analyzing the relevant data.

This appears to be especially the case in France and in the United States, though this conclusion may simply arise because I know more about the situation in these two countries. I do have knowledge that France has assumed a leading role in the scientific approach to UFOs. Acting under instruction la Gendarmerie française diligently undertook the investigation of many UFO reports. Their investigations in turn provided material for further study by a scientific group headed by Dr. Claude Poher, du CNES, nommé GEPAN. This group comprised specialists from many disciplines, not only those of physical science but in psychology and the social sciences, and in law and medicine as well. The work of this group was reviewed by an independent scientific board from the parent organization, CNES, and the group was given instructions to proceed on an expanded and well-funded basis.

This further work, I understand, has not materially advanced and, it is further my understanding from reliable sources that its initial results comprises work done on cases of high strangeness and high credibility. Seul 1 des cas fut trouvé, m'a-t-on dit, avoir une explication conventionnelle. Les autres étaient des cas de "Rencontre Rapprochée" cases, c'est-à-dire, des ovnis qui seraient intervenus à moins de 200 m des témoins approximativement, et 2 de ceux-ci furent rapportés comme était des Rencontres Rapprochées du 3ème Type... c'est-à-dire, celles dans lesquelles la présence d'être intelligents est signalée. It has also been reported that the care with which the measurement of directions, distances, and maneuvers, as well as the evaluation of psychological factors involved, were carried out was exemplary and far superior to the previous studies in other countries.

For most of the cases carefully studied, it was concluded that the UFO report involved a material phenomenon that could not be explained as a natural phenomenon or a human device. If my information is correct, then the implications for science and the public at large of this French investigation are profound. The history of science abounds with unlooked for benefits resulting from the investigation of the unknown.

Who can tell what benefits might accrue from the study of UFOsl It might well lead to the solution of many pressing problems facing man-kind today.

But we need not base our opinions or actions solely on the French in-vestigations, as competent as they may have been. Similar conclusions have already been drawn indepen-dently by scientists with whom I have been associated, many of whom, however, have been reluctant to express their opinions openly. There is a surprisingly large number of individual scientists who have expressed to me, privately and personally, their involved concern with the challenge of the UFO phenomenon, and who entertain opinions consistent with those of the French report. These scientists are in many cases associated with large and prestigious scientific organizations, both government and private, which, as organizations are silent or even officially derisiveabout the UFO phenomenon. The individuals within these organizations who have intimate knowledge of the UFO phenomenon are restrained by organizational policy to remain officially silent about their interest and in private work with UFO matters.

There are many others, not so restrained, who are independently, or in small groups, quietly studying the subject with whatever means they have at hand.

It is the scientists and specialists in both these categories that are the main concern of my address to you today, Mr. Chairman. These persons have no means by which they can share the results of their researches with other workers, or pool them for the benefit of others, as is standard practice in scientific matters. There is for them nothing remotely resembling the World Health Organ-ization or the World Meteorological Organization through which they can pool and share the results of their researches and learn what colleagues are doing in the field. Nor is there any non-governmental organization to serve this purpose. Collectively, these scientists possess information and results which, in my opinion, are important and should be shared with their colleagues elsewhere. I stress that all that is needed is a mechanism whereby such interchange can be accomplished; the actual investigative and analytical processes remain the responsibility of the scientists in their respective countries.

I am not, therefore, Mr. Chairman... and I emphasize the"not"... asking that the United Nations organization create its own commission to conduct researches into the UFO field, but merely one to provide a means whereby work and investigations already carried out and accomplished by scientists in their own countries can be expeditiously disseminated to their colleagues in other countries.

Specifically, then, Mr. Chairman, I ask, on behalf of my colleagues in this and other countries, that you recommend through appropriate channels, that there be devised a mechanism within the United Nations Organization whereby scientists and other specialists in member nations can bring together and interchange their ideas and their investigative work with colleagues in other member nations. Mr. Chairman, I seek your advice and help on how such a procedure might be brought into being without financial burden to the United Nations Organization and without disruption of the many other vital activities of this organization.

Such a mechanism, Mr. Chairman, would also facilitate the immediate exchange of information about current UFO activity in member nations.

Thus, for instance, and solely as an example, there appeared a short while ago a brief news item about a UFO sighting made in Kuwait by a number of highly qualified engineers.

It is obviously important that concerned scientists in all parts of the world be informed whether, there is any merit whatever in such a report, and if so, to assist in the investigation and analysis of the reported events. Enormous amounts of UFO data at present remain in the "newsclip" status, and data of high potential significance to science and the world is continually being lost for lack of a means to prevent its loss.

The creation of such a mechanism would also provide means whereby concerned scientists in member nations can become known to each other, and can therefore furnish each other with their already completed research work or with progress reports thereof.

Mr. Chairman, we are dealing here with an unexplained phenomenon which has been reported so far from 133 nations, and which has aroused the concern, and often the fear, of significant fractions of their population. Virtually all 133 countries are member states of the United Nations. It is a phenomenon which therefore has great possible sociological and political implications, as well as scientific potential. It is surely within the purport of the United Nations Organization to seriously consider this request that I make on behalf of my scientific colleagues everywhere.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, let me once again clearly state that it is my considered opinion, as a scientist who has devoted many years to its study, that the UFO phenomenon is real and not the creation of disturbed minds, and that it has both grave and important implications for science and for the political and social well-being of the peoples of this Earth. It is therefore, in my opinion, worthy of cognizance by the United Nations Organization, and worthy of study as a phenomenon. I distinguish sharply here, as do my colleagues, between any given theory of the UFO such as, for example, that they originate in some specific solar system, and the phenomenon itself, a situation which would put the cart before the horse.

Mr. Chairman, I have not always held the opinion that UFOs were worthy of serious scientific study. I began my work as Scientific Consultant to the U.S. Air Force as an open skeptic, in the firm belief that we were dealing with a mental aberration and a public nuisance. Only in the face of stubborn facts and data similar to those studied by the French commission... have I been forced to change my opinion. I recognize, Mr. Chairman, that an opinion, no matter on what insights or experience it is based, still does not constitute positive proof. The creation of a mechanism within the United Nations to facilitate the exchange and translation of UFO reports and studies made in various member nations will, I firmly believe, hasten the day when this opinion will be translated into firm scientific knowledge.

Le phénomène ovni, tel qu'étudié par mes collègues et moi-même, annonce l'action d'une forme d'intelligence... mais d'où cette intelligence ressort, qu'elle soit vraiment extra-terrestre, ou annonce une réalité supérieure encore non reconnue de la science, ou même if it be in some way or another a strange psychic manifestation of our own intelligence, is much the question. We seek your help, Mr. Chairman, in assisting scientists, and particularly those already associated with the many formal and informal investigative organizations around the world, by providing a clearing house procedure whereby the work already going on globally can be brought together in a serious, concentrated approach to this most outstanding challenge to current science.