Frauds, Hucksters, & Charlatans: The Other Kind of Demonic Activity (S5, E7)

Summary

Haunted Cosmos – "Frauds, Hucksters, & Charlatans: The Other Kind of Demonic Activity"

Season 5, Episode 7 — Released: September 17, 2025
Hosts: Ben Garrett & Brian Sauvé

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Main Theme

This season finale explores the thriving world of supernatural frauds, examining historical and modern examples of charlatanism in spiritualist movements, UFO lore, and parapsychological research. Ben and Brian set out to expose the deceptions and dangers of spiritual manipulation, showing not only how people are fooled, but also how intentional trickery sometimes unintentionally invokes real spiritual phenomena. The episode weaves narrative storytelling, cultural critique, and theological warnings—always in the duo’s sharp, wry, and candid style.

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Key Discussion Points

1. The Fox Sisters: From Prank to Spiritualist Movement

([01:14]–[25:45])

• Detailed Retelling: The story of the Fox Sisters—Leah, Maggie, and Kate—is recounted, starting from their move to a supposedly haunted house in Hydesville, New York, in 1847, and the infamous pranks that led locals to believe the girls could communicate with spirits through knocks and raps.
• Birth of American Spiritualism: What began as a joke became the foundation of 19th-century spiritualism, with seances, coded knocking, and the sisters’ alleged communication with the spirit "Mr. Splitfoot" (a colloquial reference to Satan).
• Rapid Rise: The girls achieved fame, intrigued elite Victorian society, and catalyzed the formation of spiritualist churches. Brian notes, “Spiritualism offered a haven to the lost, the outcast, and the spiritually restless. Here, at last, was a religion that seemed true, holy, powerful and entirely modern. One you could see with your own eyes and hear with your own ears.” ([~22:42])
• Moral Degradation & Downfall: The sisters’ fame led to alcoholism, family strife, and eventual public disgrace as Maggie, after converting to Catholicism, confessed the entirety of their act was a hoax—demonstrating onstage how the sounds were faked.
• Aftermath: Despite confession and exposure, the spiritualist movement continued to flourish, underlining how deeply people longed for spiritual experience—even if fraudulent.

2. Theme Framing & Exposing Spiritual Fraud

([28:15]–[34:36])

• Ben and Brian set their intention for the episode: to debunk the notion they’re credulous of all supernatural claims and affirm that “exposing the unfruitful works of darkness” (Ephesians 5:11) is part of the Christian calling.
• False Spiritual Longings: Brian points out, "The human soul will latch onto lesser spiritual things in an attempt to find satisfaction outside of God… It will be easily taken in by spiritual frauds." ([32:14])
• Materialism and Spiritual Deception: They critique modern spiritualism’s blend of materialist skepticism with irrational openness to "spiritual" charlatans.

3. The Roswell Alien Autopsy Hoax

([35:47]–[54:54])

• Roswell Recap: The 1947 New Mexico incident is described—how a rancher reported finding a "flying saucer," leading to frenzied speculation and a famous newspaper headline.
• The Alien Autopsy (1995): The hosts detail how British filmmaker Ray Santilli released a supposedly historic video of an alien being dissected, sparking massive media hysteria and debate.
• The Reveal: Santilli admitted 11 years later the tape was fake, concocted with actors and props (including on-the-record confessions from a prop maker), though he still claimed it was based on "real" film he once saw.
• Lessons in Skepticism: Ben muses on the eagerness to believe—“I watched a documentary that was very convincing in trying to say, no, this is real… this is how the sausage is made when it comes to dissecting extraterrestrials,” ([54:24]), before Brian underscores the need for discernment.

4. Project Alpha: Magicians Fool the Scientists

([62:26]–[81:00])

• Project Alpha Overview: In 1979’s St. Louis, parapsychology researchers launched "Project Alpha" to study psychic phenomena. Unknown to them, two young illusionists—under the mentorship of famed skeptic James Randi—schemed to get selected as participants and then used magic tricks to produce fake supernatural feats.
• Deception in Action: The magicians bent spoons, read photographs, moved objects, and manipulated thermal imaging, all using sleight of hand while researchers, desperate to believe, adjusted protocols to accommodate them. Ben describes the scientist’s credulity: “Oh, my psychic energy is getting in the way. You’re able to see what’s inside because when I left the room…” ([73:15])
• Public Humiliation: At a press conference in 1983, Randi exposed the hoax, devastating the reputations and careers of the researchers, shutting down their lab.
• Reflection: The hosts marvel at the power of stage magic and the ease with which even well-meaning, intelligent people can be duped by their spiritual longings—while firing off tongue-in-cheek banter about the ethics of the "lesson."

5. When Fakery Draws the Real: The Philip Experiment

([81:07]–[90:08])

• Constructing a Haunting: Ben recounts how Toronto researchers in 1972 invented "Philip Aylesford," a completely fictional 17th-century English nobleman, to test whether a group could convince itself of communicating with a non-existent ghost.
• Unexpected Results: After several fruitless attempts, the group changed the atmosphere to a classic candle-lit seance. Suddenly, physical phenomena—inexplicable knocks, voices, moving furniture—began to manifest. Ultimately, the table levitated and crashed—events reportedly witnessed by researchers themselves.
• Unresolved Outcome: The experiment ended in anxiety and uncertainty, the group fearful that they had contacted "something" real, even though "Philip" was a fabrication.
• Warning Delivered: Ben’s final words: “Beware of calling on devils—even devils in which you don’t believe—because they might just answer.” ([~90:08])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Fraudulent Spiritualism:
  "It’s almost funny, in a tragic sort of way, that one man’s brutal death and allegedly his restless spirit helped spark the American spiritualist movement, a phenomenon that would eventually lead countless souls into spiritual darkness."
  — Ben ([~11:50])

• On the Human Heart:
  "Look at the people that are taken in by it and understand something about the human soul in its fallen state…it was made to be satisfied in a spiritual reality, which is God Himself. The human soul will latch onto lesser spiritual things in an attempt to find that satisfaction outside of God."
  — Brian ([32:14])

• On Maggie Fox’s Confession:
  "With total silence filling the room, Maggie Fox did the last thing anyone had been expecting. She loudly confessed to the audience that she and her sister were frauds, that it had all been a hoax."
  — Ben ([24:25])

• On the Santilli Alien Autopsy:
  "Look, did I elaborately hoax an alien autopsy video? Yes. But I was elaborately copying a video I saw that wasn’t hoax."
  — Brian, mocking Santilli’s self-exculpation ([50:58])

• On Project Alpha’s Demise:
  "What I love is, James Randi’s basically like ‘it was all a fake, you’re welcome for the moral lesson.’"
  — Ben ([71:30])

• On the Dangers of Invoking Spirits:
  "What had begun as a deliberately fraudulent paranormal experiment had transformed into something the researchers no longer understood and could not control. Beware, of calling on devils—even devils in which you don’t believe—because they might just answer."
  — Ben ([~90:04])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Fox Sisters & Spiritualism: [01:14]–[25:45]
• Episode Themes & Spiritual Deception: [28:15]–[34:36]
• Roswell Alien Autopsy Hoax: [35:47]–[54:54]
• Project Alpha (Magicians vs Parapsychologists): [62:26]–[81:00]
• Philip Experiment—Faking a Ghost Gone Wrong: [81:07]–[90:08]

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Tone & Style Summary

The conversation is an animated mix of storytelling, dry humor, inside jokes, and genuine moral concern. As always, Ben and Brian alternate between engaging narrative, theological perspective, and irreverent banter—balancing skepticism with the belief in actual spiritual reality. Their playful tone is particularly sharp when lampooning both gullible spiritualists and overweening skeptics.

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Conclusion

The episode closes with a theological warning: Fraudulent spiritual practices often open doors to real spiritual danger, despite the intentions or beliefs of those involved. The hosts remind listeners that the longing for transcendence and the lure of the supernatural are powerful—and that discernment, humility, and faithfulness are vital in a world teeming with both hoaxes and genuine spiritual evil.

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End of Season Five

Transcript

[A]

You've requested it and we've listened. This October, we're premiering a new series where we sit down and hear from real listeners of the show. You'll hear stories of UFO activity, real demonic encounters, and puzzling poltergeist trickery. Join us this October for the Graveyard Shift. And now enjoy the season finale of Season five of Haunted Cosmos.

[B]

This episode is brought to you by Zilli Creative Works, bringing you face to face family fun that is fierce, fast and affordable.

[A]

The world is not just stuff. The widely publicized mystery of the flying saucers may soon be solved.

[B]

Long time ago, there was a man living alone in a wooden house. The house stood deep in the forest, and the forest itself was dense and dark. Sunlight seldom penetrated the thick blanket of leaves woven over the home. His life was simple. Water was always close at hand, and in those days woodland creatures were not as scarce as they are now. He trapped and hunted and fished and lived in peace. Yet he was not entirely alone in the region. Not far away was a small village called Hydesville. Fur traders mostly inhabited it, though the settlement was no stranger to the occasional traveler passing through. It was an exciting time in the infancy of America. The west was said to be open and filled with gold, while the east was secured for the budding nation commerce flowing in from strange lands across the ocean. This man did not live in the west, nor was he near the coast. His home was cradled between the pines of northwestern New York, a place where he could enjoy solitude without being so far removed from the New World's happenings as to be irrelevant to them. His name is lost to history. Some say it was Bell, but that's nothing more than an unreliable guess. It could just as easily have been any other name. Fortunately, the man's name matters little to this story. One day, late in the morning, the man was chopping firewood in a small clearing behind his house. The day was perfectly serene. The wind rustled the leaves overhead, occasionally slipping beneath the canopy to cool the forest's shaded byways. The air was crisp, and his stomach was still satisfied from breakfast. He chopped steadily, the rhythmic sound of his ax blending in with the nature that had nurtured him. He was convinced that he was a beneficent part of the land he lived on and off of. Yet the loud noise of his work meant that apart from the birds, the breeze, and the babbling creek nearby, there were no other sounds. No deer or rodents dared approach such an irregular disturbance. Whenever the man paused to rest, the forest seemed quieter than usual. He could hear far and during one of those breaks, he heard the clatter of hooves echoing from somewhere to the south, growing steadily closer. The man thrust his axe into the chopping stump, where it stuck fast. He slid his hand down the worn hickory handle and walked to the rag draped over the back porch rail. Wiping the sweat from his brow and neck, he he sat down to wait for the approaching rider. Soon a lone traveler emerged from the trees. He was heading west and needed to stable his horse for the day and night. He said that he had ridden through the entire previous night. The man obliged and took the weary horse. After tending to the animal, he led the traveler inside and offered him a couch in the main room. The traveler lay down and within a minute was fast asleep and snoring. The man went about his day. He finished chopping wood, snacked on dried venison for lunch, and spent the remaining daylight checking his traps and making rounds to his shed. As dusk fell, he returned to the back porch, weary and with a growling stomach. He knew he would need to prepare enough food for both himself and his guest. A thought that tempted a quiet groan. But his sense of duty caught the complaint before it surfaced, and with a deep breath, he climbed the few porch steps and entered his house. He failed to notice that his axe was no longer embedded in the stump where he had left it hours earlier. The murder happened swiftly. One moment the man was frying bacon, the next the room was a chaos of blood, heat, and groaning. The traveler left the axe buried in the man's back, gathered what few valuables the house held, saddled his horse, and rode off into the Appalachian night. He was never found, though to be fair, no one looked very hard. But the murdered man, or so the story goes, did not leave his home so easily. Later seances held at the house, which had by then become a place of strange importance, revealed that the man's spirit lingered. He was neither angry nor malevolent to those he contacted. He was simply sad. Those seances played a part in establishing the credibility of of some of early America's most famous spiritualists. The mediums would speak to the spirit in ways the attendees could not comprehend, then relay or translate the conversations to those attendees. Sure enough, the accounts would then be allegedly corroborated by local lore. Thus, their abilities were proven and their reputation spread far and wide. It's almost funny, in a tragic sort of way, that one man's brutal death and allegedly his restless spirit helped spark the American spiritualist movement, a phenomenon that would eventually lead countless souls into spiritual darkness. It all began with an unnamed man murdered by an unnamed traveler with an axe. The story's veracity was never questioned. Why would the mediums lie? But who were these mediums? Who were these shadowy agents claiming to speak with the meek murdered man? They were none other than Kate and Maggie Fox, perhaps the most infamous mediums in American history. The 1790s marked the beginning of a radical spiritual revolution in America. It began simply enough, fiery sermons pouring from Presbyterian, Baptist and Methodist pulpits in Tennessee and Kentucky. These were calls for reform within the church and a renewed piety among the people. But the movement soon spiraled into something dangerous, a deep and abiding hunger for more. Spiritually speaking, ordinary churchgoers grew bored with God's ordinary means of grace. They began to rely on the shifting tides of their own religious emotions as the measure of their faith. If they felt on fire for God one day, they were encouraged. If they felt cold or spiritually distant the next, they doubted their salvation. This era is now known as the Second Great Awakening, and its fruits are, by and large, rotten. The religious institutions of both the antebellum north and south atrophied and twisted into peculiar offshoots that forgot their roots. Adventism, dispensationalism, and even Mormonism can trace their earliest seeds to this dark chapter in church history. Yet these theological shifts were accompanied by even less savory trends. American Christians became obsessed, and I really do mean obsessed, with bridging the gap between the seen and the unseen worlds. Occultism crept into the church. Seances became popular. Close communication with the dead was. Was no longer seen as a sin deserving hellfire, but as an innocent fascination or even a comforting part of everyday life. At the height of this chaotic movement, three daughters were born to John and Margaret Fox of upstate New York. The parents were devout Methodists at a time when devotion to Methodism meant very little. The girls, Leah, Maggie, and Kate, spent their early years immersed in the rituals of the radical Methodists. They followed their parents. They learned the dance well. And one of the most important lessons the three of them absorbed was spiritualism sells. If they wanted to make a name for themselves, and they did, even in their youth, they would have to play by the church's new dangerous rules. In 1847, when Leah had already left the house to start a family of her own, the two younger Fox sisters moved with their parents to Hydesville, New York, into that same old wooden house where a man had been murdered many years before. At the time, Maggie was 14 and Kate was 10. The first year in the House passed quickly and without much excitement. The family settled into a new routine and by all reports, made a fairly charming life for themselves. But in 1848, things began to change. Leah was visiting her sisters for the holiday. The small house meant they all had to share a room each night. On the first night, as rain poured down in the wild world outside, the sisters talked by candlelight. Maggie and Kate confided a great secret to Leah. They told her the house was haunted. They said that on most nights, spirits came knocking in their room and tried to speak to them. They said they had finally figured out a way to communicate and had already been doing so for months. Leah was skeptical. After all, Kate was only 11, and Maggie, though older, was still a youth. Leah humored them, played along, but kept her doubts for nearly an hour as the sisters tried to convince her. What wore on Leah was not the words themselves, but the way her sisters were speaking. They weren't emotional, not even Kate. They were calm, confident, holding all the cards in the conversation. Leah sensed that they truly believed what they were saying. Finally, she asked them to show her. Maggie moved over to Kate's bed and sat beside her on the edge. Both girls sat bolt upright. The candle's glow danced on the walls, seeming to grow brighter. The noises of the old house quieted. The patter of the rain faded. The squeaks of wooden bed frames fell silent. Faint drafts seemed to whisper through the room, and Lya felt her hair shift as the air grew colder. The candlelight, which had grown brighter, now began to dim. Where once the walls of the room had been visible, now they were swallowed by shadow. No light from the window, no shadows on the uneven plaster. All that remained were the three girls, the candle a faint flicker now, and the beds they sat upon. Maggie and Kate tilted their heads upward toward the ceiling, though it too was lost to the darkness. To Leah it seemed that everything light, warmth, sound had fled, leaving them in some hollow place beyond the reach of morning. The girls began to hum, or perhaps moan very softly, though their mouths remained closed. The cold grew sharper, biting even. In the moments Lia spent observing these changes, she felt herself drawn away, as though the room itself had drifted into some dead place, bereft of the hope that comes with the dawn. Then suddenly, from the walls she could no longer see, there came a sound wrapping. It wasn't gentle or soft. It was harsh and forced, as though nails were being dragged down paper by someone who loathed the sensation. The rapping turned into slow, heavy knocking. Leah wondered how her parents could sleep through it. All the candle dimmed further until Leah could just barely make out the red outlines of her sister's faces, still upturned, still with eyes and mouths closed. Then Kate spoke in the most somber and flat tone Leah had ever heard. Now do as I do. Kate lifted her hand and snapped her fingers. The snap echoed unnaturally through the silence, ringing in Leah's ears until she felt nauseous. When the sound had faded, Leah waited. Intense silence. Then from the oppressive darkness came an answering snap, deeper, richer, and echoing far longer. The sound seemed thick, though Leah could not explain why. Maggie then spoke in a tone eerily similar to Kate's. Now knock at once. A knock was heard. We will now ask you questions. Knock once for yes and twice for no. A single knock followed, as if to confirm that the spirit would follow their rules. Did you once live in this house? The knock sounded almost before the question was finished. Are you the man the neighbors remember as Bell Two Knocks? Lia stirred. She noticed her sisters wince, as though they hadn't expected that reply. Are you someone else? A single knock. Are you Mr. Split Foot? A single knock. Leah tried to steady her breathing and glanced at Kate. She thought she saw the faintest trace of a smile on her sister's lips. Somehow this calmed her. Are you playing a trick on us? A single knock. Are you sure you aren't the man named Bell Two Knocks? No. Leah watched her sisters relax. Belle, would you show our sister something she will not forget? A single knock. What followed was a sudden and chaotic whirlwind. The candle flared, flooding the room with unnatural brightness. Everything, the walls, the furniture, the beds was visible once again, as though the preceding darkness had never been. The room shook. A fierce wind rushed through the sisters, tossing their hair and blurring Leah's vision. In the midst of the gale, she thought she heard faint laughter, but maniacal and tortured, as if someone were struggling to laugh through terrible pain. And then, just as suddenly, it was over. The room fell quiet. The candlelight returned to normal. Maggie and Kate lowered their heads from their trance and met Leah's wide, terrified eyes with calm smiles. Leah was convinced in later years she would learn that Mr. Splitfoot was a colloquial name for Satan himself. Had she known that then, one wonders how different things might have turned out. In the months that followed, the Fox sisters began to build their reputation as mediums and spiritualists. Leah proved highly skilled at stirring local interest in Maggie and Kate's abilities. Of course, the religious fervor of the moment helped enormously. Their parents, John and Margaret, were proud of the girls and encouraged them to host seances as often as they liked. Each seance was much like the one Leah had witnessed. Wraps on the walls would give way to knocks, which the sisters used to communicate with whichever spirits they had summoned. Over time, they developed a system that allowed spirits to spell out words and even common phrases. Radicals from nearly every major religious group were enthralled. Quakers, Methodists and Adventists were especially fascinated. They begged the sisters to contact dead relatives, saints, even old enemies. The Fox sisters obliged and seemed to succeed. The more they succeeded, the more the public adored them. What could be more charming than two young girls using their gifts to serve their community? For that is how the community community saw them. Faithful sisters trying to love their neighbors in a way only they could. Eventually, the crowds became too large for the family's small home. The girls left their parents behind in Hydesville and went to live with Leah, who now managed their increasingly busy schedules. But the crowds followed. Soon the same throngs gathered at their new home. Among the visitors were Isaac and Amy Post, a prominent Quaker couple. They took an immediate liking to the sisters and invited them and Leah to live in their much larger home in Rochester, New York. Rochester was the real launch pad for their spiritualist careers. The city was larger and wealthier than anywhere they had been before. Its rich families were eager to hear what the sisters offered. Rochester also had venues, concert halls and ballrooms that could hold hundreds. With Leah's management, the sisters soon filled those concert halls. Before long, profits began to roll in. The Fox sisters would go on to host the first for profit seance on American soil. Performed before a live audience. What some expected to be a fleeting rise to fame became a lucrative and seemingly reliable career, One no one in the family could have predicted. Soon the elites took note notice. Rich men in fine suits attended with wives and mistresses on their arms during the seances. Anyone in the audience could ask questions through the sisters. And ask they did about bonds, stocks, westward railroad projects. The women asked about lovers, affairs, siblings, old grievances. Maggie and Kate answered each question Using their developed codes of knocks and wraps. Audiences were satisfied. They kept coming back. After just one year in Rochester, the sisters were selling out the city's largest venues. Prominent figures even attended. George Bancroft, Sojourner Truth. Each left in awe. Even Elizabeth Cady Stanton sought their counsel, asking the spirits to affirm her campaign against patriarchal oppression. Naturally, the spirits obliged. Demons would. Stanton began weaving spiritualism into her feminism, but culminating in her writing of the women's bible. Everything seemed to be Going well for the Fox girls. They were young, adored, and growing richer by the day. It was, in a twisted way, the American dream. But as the saying goes, the rain that makes the crops grow brings the mud, too. And the sisters were not prepared for it. They took to wine. Their admirers were happy to indulge them. Soon they were drinking regularly, addicted. The wine began to take a toll on her health, and they aged quickly. The shows grew sloppier, not enough for audiences to notice, but enough that Leah did. The burden of fame weighed heavily on the young sisters, yet the profits were too good to walk away from. They continued, driven by desire and by whatever it was they had been communing with since those first nights in Hydesville. Then came an unexpected, at least to them, turn. The sisters found themselves elevated to the status of spiritual gurus. Some saw them as founders of a new religion. They were hailed as miracle workers, healers, prophetesses of a new spiritual order. Spiritualist churches opened across the Northeast, each one inspired by the Fox sisters. The movement offered a haven to the lost, the outcast and the spiritually restless. Here, at last, was a religion that seemed true, holy, powerful and entirely modern. One you could see with your own eyes and hear with your own ears. By the 1860s, as the Civil War ravaged the south, the spiritualist movement had millions of adherents in both the United States and Europe. It seemed that modernity had fully embraced Maggie and Kate Fox. And then came the downfall. The money dried up as quickly as it had come. They made mountains of money, but somehow spent even more. The sisters grew bitter toward Leah, who they believed had profited unfairly from their name. Greed and resentment fractured the family as blood feuds erupted and bitterness sent its taproot deep into each sister's heart. They stopped doing their stage shows. They proclaimed their spiritualist powers to the world. But the golden age was over. Drama and difficulty seemed to follow them everywhere. Then, in the 1880s, something unexpected happened. Maggie converted to Roman Catholicism. Her heart was stolen away by the church, and she became a different person. She scorned seances, believing them now to be wicked and vile things. She spoke viciously against all magic and necromancy. Her outrage at her past was met with a silence from those who had so recently hung their lives on her every word. Her friends left her, her family distanced from her. She was alone, left to pick up the pieces of the life she had wasted. And in 1888, she picked up the final piece. She still drank too much. She still wrestled with doubts. But she started to become convinced that doing just one thing would make all the other troubles waste away a desperate bid for redemption. The hall at New York Academy of Music was packed full over 2000 people sat in their seats, looking at the nearly empty stage, wondering what was about to happen. Kate Fox sat in the front row, staring up at the aging and troubled woman that used to be her sister. With total silence filling the room, Maggie Fox did the last thing anyone had been expecting. She loudly confessed to the audience that she and her sister were frauds, that it had all been a hoax. It took a moment for the revelation to have its effect. Small laughter was eventually swallowed by gasps and shouts. Shouts of anger and shouts of disbelief. All the same, Maggie remembered that night that Leah sat in their room watching them perform their ruse. She had fallen for it all, even the joke that their ghost told them about being a spirit named Mr. Split Foot. Her entire life had just been that same prank, played day after day for millions of people that she stole money from. In the midst of the tumultuous hall, Kate Fox remained quiet and still in the front row. When the room settled, Maggie repeated herself. Then she set about proving the hoax, inviting doctors and audience members to join her on stage. There, she demonstrated how she and Kate had produced the mysterious knocks by cracking their ankles, toes, knuckles, and through subtle techniques to confuse the audience about where the sounds had come from. The confession lasted an hour. When it was done, Maggie left the stage alone. But whatever she had hoped to gain from her confession never materialized. She descended into deeper alcoholism and debt. She left the Catholic Church months later. Desperate, she recanted her confession, claiming it had all been a joke, another prank, another ruse. But by then, the damage had been done. Yet the spiritualist movement was undeterred. It continued to grow, inviting more deception, more debauchery. Today, it's estimated that upward of 2 million Americans identify as spiritualists or mediums. In Europe, the number is similar. In Latin America and the east, it's four far higher. And all of it, all of that deception can be traced in many ways back to a prank Maggie and Kate Fox once played on their older sister Leah during the fervor of the Second Great Awakening. Maggie Fox died in Brooklyn in 1893. Kate Fox died in New York City in 1892. Leah Fox died in Rochester in 1890. Welcome to the final episode of season five of Haunted Cosmos. In this episode, we expose cases of fraud and deception in the strange and shadowy world of high strangeness. Escape Master is a fast paced fantasy card game that your family game night needs. Think of Speed or Dutch Blitz. Mixed with deep fantasy lore, battle strategies and character building. Made by a Christian husband and wife duo with the goal to bring your family together. It's portable for on the go play, family friendly and wildly fun. 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[A]

Brian, I got bad news the other day. I was using one of the big box soap products to wash myself and I got this weird urge to go buy a Stanley cup and fill it with iced coffee. And it started to feel a little cold in the house. I just wanted to wrap myself up in like a heavy wool blanket. And then also I started googling ticket prices to Taylor Swift concerts.

[B]

Ben, what are you doing? Don't you know that these big box soap companies just jam all their soaps full of hormone disrupting chemicals? They're probably turning you into a girl.

[A]

Well, I know that now, but what am I supposed to do about it then?

[B]

You ignorant Normie? All you've needed to do is go to Indigo Sundries soap and support a great Christian family business that's making all sorts of soaps that are completely free of hormone disrupting chemicals and other nasties.

[A]

Okay, I am literally going to indigo sundrysoap.com right now. Tell me what to buy.

[B]

Ben. What I would recommend doing is clicking on Bundles and then selecting the best one for you. You could get the men's six pack. You could get my favorite, the Clay bundle.

[A]

Ooh, I like the pipe and jug bundle. That seems cool. Or a men's six pack because that'll make me feel like I have something that I actually don't.

[B]

So true, King. And you know what else I heard? Because they're such good friends of the show, Indigo Sundries Soap Company is offering 10% off your order if you just use all caps discount code HAUNTED Cosmos, no spaces.

[A]

Wait, Brian, you're going way too fast. I didn't get all that. Is that information in the show description?

[B]

Ben, you ignorant normie. It's always in the show description.

[A]

Okay, so I'm going to go to indigosundrysoap.com I'm going to pick the men's six pack bundle, and I'm going to use code Haunted Cosmos at checkout. All caps, no spaces. And if I forgot all that, it's in the description of the show.

[B]

Of course, Ben. And if you just do that, then you will stop wanting to do all of those girly things and maybe you'll, I don't know, maybe want to buy a classic car to restore or something. Dignified man, Ben. I knew we were handsome, but I didn't know we were that handsome until I saw our recent Haunted Cosmos thumbnail.

[A]

Yeah. Your skin looks so velvety smooth.

[B]

I mean, it's unbelievable. Chris at New Dominion Design Company did an absolutely fantastic job, not only on those thumbnails, but on our recent book cover as well.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. And if you need some design work from Chris, you should go to newdominiondesignco.com get started there, and he'll serve you right, man.

[B]

He will make you look 50% as handsome as Ben, guaranteed.

[A]

Welcome, everyone, to the season five finale of Haunted Cosmos. Yes, just to quote my French brother here. Finale? Isn't that how you say it, the French?

[B]

Like, I think they would say it something like, oh, I like men.

[A]

The French are like, the French.

[B]

Like, sorry to our French listeners who.

[A]

Are heterosexual and you are also French.

[B]

I'm sorry to our heterosexual French listeners, all three.

[A]

The French language is so funny. It, like, takes out all consonants. And it reminds me, actually, of a lot of, like, butt rock music that I really like, where Pearl, like, Eddie Vedder at Pearl Jam. He, like, doesn't pronounce any consonants.

[B]

It's why Ben likes me. It's because I'm French.

[A]

That's so true. Evanescence, please edit this out.

[B]

Keep all of that.

[A]

All right, we're here. Season 5 finale of Hanakazu, and it's been fun. It has been fun. There's been a fun season season.

[B]

I mean, we're capping this one off, too, with, like, an episode that I've wanted to do to shut up the haters.

[A]

Yeah, that's right.

[B]

That say, like, Ben and Brian have never met a supernatural story that they didn't believe entirely.

[A]

Oh, they just believe every. True. Yeah.

[B]

But secondly, no, it's not like, I.

[A]

Still have My suspicions.

[B]

Come on.

[A]

The Fox Sisters, you know, that's like, it could all. I think it could have all been.

[B]

Real, but if it was, it was a demon.

[A]

Yeah, if it was. It was a demon. Actually, we're going to get into some stories that are like. They, like. Yeah, we'll just leave it.

[B]

Here's the thing.

[A]

I'm just gonna leave it there.

[B]

We're gonna leave you in this episode with one of the coolest.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Crossover stories between exposing frauds, but also, like. Wait, hang on.

[A]

One more. Yeah, because what we don't want to do is just give you a bunch of stories about frauds that are all the same, where we try and, like, judge it up and make you think, oh, this is gonna be legit.

[B]

And then you're like, told you in.

[A]

The title, foiled again. They're a fraud. No. So just wait.

[B]

The hot clothes of this episode is gonna leave you more satisfied than Martina McBride's famous summer hit.

[A]

Independence Day. Independence Day, Yes. And it's gonna leave you smashing that, like, and subscribe button harder than you have ever smashed anything in your life. Harder than the.

[B]

No bag. I don't know. I think we can agree that you should hit the like and subscribe. And we'll just leave it at that. And. And forever leave you wondering, what did they just cut out with a bleep that. Ben said it wasn't inappropriate. It was just wildly inappropriate.

[A]

It was historically inappropriate. Anyway, so we're glad that you guys are here. Some themes to think through as we go through the episode are like, look at the consequences of. Of lying.

[B]

Can I give you. Can I give you a theme here, Ben?

[A]

Give me.

[B]

Because this is how I think about the importance of this episode for what we do. What are we trying to do in haunted cosmos? We're basically trying to take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but expose them. Ephesians 5:11. That's a lot of.

[A]

I was going to say, I think an apostle said that one time.

[B]

Yeah. Like a guy whose name rhymes with ball gall. Like, he has the gall to be the apostle Paul. You know what I'm saying? So that's one of the things that we're trying to do with this show, is to say, hey, aliens. Demonic spiritual deception. They're not little gray men from Omicron. Percy I8.

[A]

Nice reference.

[B]

No, they're. It's deep. It's Ultra Tourette. They're demons. They're spiritual entities that. That Bigfoot that is giving you a spirit, a feeling of dread. And, like, trying to heal you of your pain and just get you to commune with it. It's a Fae. It's a demon. Stop it. Gets dead.

[A]

That Bigfoot and that recent video coming out of Colorado. Well, recent at the time of recording, like, at this point, four months old.

[B]

Several months.

[A]

Came out of Colorado, though. Very clear. Bigfoot witnessed by dozens of people all looking across this gully. Yeah, that Bigfoot was a demon trying to eat your soul.

[B]

It's trying to swallow your soul. So that's the theme. Expose spiritual works of darkness. One of the things that I want to expose in an episode like this where we're talking about all of the people who have attempted to use the spiritual world, the unseen world, to manipulate and unlawful gain. All these things look at the people that are taken in by it and understand something about the human soul in its fallen state. And it's because it was made to be satisfied in a spiritual reality, which is God himself. The human soul will latch onto lesser spiritual things in an attempt to find that satisfaction outside of God. And so what will it do? It will be easily taken in by spiritual frauds. So this isn't just an episode about, like, kind of doing. We're not doing the Reddit atheist thing where we're saying, like, oh, all supernatural stuff. It's all made up. It's all magicians, you know, because, like, could God make a stone so heavy even he couldn't lift it? And then everyone's like, oh, yeah, dude, that's crazy. Like, I live in my mom's basement.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Comments all day.

[A]

That question has been answered many, many times. Read the summa.

[B]

Come on. Like, come on, read the summa. You're not even reading the summa.

[A]

Read the summa. Read the summa. Just read the summa. God is so omniscient, he can't contradict himself.

[B]

Dude.

[A]

It's that simple.

[B]

He can't contradict his own nature.

[A]

Yeah. And you also see that, like, man desires transcendence.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Spiritual transcendence, even, you know, and by consequences, a type of physical transcendence. We desire glory. But if you are so deceived with a materialist mindset, or you're living in this materialist world that still has a vein of spiritualism running through it, which, by the end of the episode, you'll see that we very much live in a spiritualist world, not so much a strictly materialist world. You will get like, you're priming the pomp to be deceived in some of the most. And I'll say stupid ways where you're being deceived by a materialist with spiritualism.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You're an idiot if that happens to you.

[B]

They're calling on Tash.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

They don't believe in him.

[A]

And.

[B]

And just because you're taken in by them doesn't mean that Tash won't be.

[A]

There waiting for you. Yes, exactly. You've appealed to Tash. To Tash. You'll go now, should we get right into the first story or after the cold open.

[B]

Yeah, let's continue. I like where this story takes us next because we've had the Fox sisters this like. And I love how that showed the nexus of, like, just millions of people being deceived. It started with a literal prank.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then these sisters found out, like, oh, this is super profitable for us. But also the toll it made on them that they ended up with broken relationship and their family crippled by alcoholism and drunkenness and ultimately destroyed by succeeding in the deception that they sought to unfold on people.

[A]

To quote Bane, victory defeated them. And as one final comment, I've always. I don't know why this is, but when I first learned about the story through writing it, up till now, I've always imagined Leia Fox, the older sister who managed as like a Rosie o' Donnell type.

[B]

Really?

[A]

Yep. With that, I think we can go into the next story.

[B]

Yeah, take us into the next story.

[A]

Sounds good.

[B]

Late this afternoon, a bulletin from New Mexico suggested that the widely publicized mystery.

[A]

Of the flying saucers may soon be solved. ARMY Air Force Officer it was the summer of 1947. A man was surveying his ranch outside of Roswell, New Mexico. The air was thin and the sun made the distant horizon shimmer in waves of heat. The wind blew hard enough to sway the short chaparral branches around him. The sky was pale blue and totally empty. As the rancher stood thinking, he idly kicked at a piece of sandstone with the toe of his boot. His arms were crossed and his horse stood beside him, lazily shaking its mane. Occasionally, he glanced toward the cattle grazing in a small patch of grass about a quarter mile away. During one of these glances, the man noticed something new in the previously vacant sky. A glimmering object was falling steadily toward the earth. He hadn't seen where it had come from. A thin trail of gas or vapor drifted behind it as it descended. He looked closer, shading his eyes with one hand beneath the brim of his hat. What a curious thing. He couldn't for the life of him make sense of it. He had seen Planes before, and this was no plane. It fell slowly and moved in strange, unnatural ways through the air. Yet even so, he felt certain of one thing. It was falling. Finally, the object crashed some distance away. From his vantage point, he could just barely make out the faint reflective glimmer of it atop a low ridge across the valley. He felt a jolt of excitement. It had come down on his property. He mounted his horse and loped toward the site at an easy pace. Exactly what happened when he reached the object is lost to history or has become muddled with hearsay. All we know for certain is what the man did next. He raced home. The sheriff was called, and he came out dutifully to see what the rancher had discovered. After that, the army was called and. And they came in to do the same. But the army didn't stop at merely inspecting the strange object. They picked it up, loaded it onto a truck undercover and transported it to the Roswell army airfield. The rancher and the sheriff were left dumbfounded by the army's behavior. The soldiers asked very few questions and provided very little information. They simply hauled the thing away and never spoke to either man about it ever again. This time, secrecy becomes all the more strange when one considers who the army did speak to. The local newspaper. In hindsight, this was likely a serious blunder. The paper, ever hungry for sensational stories, immediately recognized that this curious incident could be much, much bigger. The article they published following their contact with the army read as the Roswell Daily Record, July 8, 1947. The Intelligence Office of the 509th December Bombardment Group at Roswell Army Airfield announced at noon today that the field has come into possession of a flying saucer. According to information released by the department, the disc was recovered on a ranch in the Roswell vicinity after an unidentified rancher had notified Sheriff Wilcox here that he had found the instrument on his premises. Major Marcel, in a detail from his department, went to the ranch and recovered the disc as it was stated. After the intelligence office here had inspected the instrument, it was flown to higher headquarters. The intelligence office stated that no details of the saucer's construction or its appearance had been revealed. Mr. And Mrs. Dan Wilmot apparently were the only persons in Roswell who have seen what they thought was a flying disc. They were sitting on their porch at 105 South Pen last Wednesday night at about 10 minutes before 10 o', clock, when a large glowing object zoomed out of the sky from the southeast, going in a northwesterly direction at a high rate of speed. Wilmot called Mrs. Wilmot's attention to it, and both ran down into the yard to watch. It was in sight less than a minute, perhaps 40 or 50 seconds. Wilmot said that it appeared to him to be about 1500ft high and going fast. He estimated between 400 and 500 miles per hour. In appearance, it looked oval in shape, like two inverted saucers faced mouth to mouth, or like two old type washbowls placed together in the same fashion. The entire body glowed as though light were showing through from inside, though not like it would be if a light were merely underneath. From where he stood, Wilmot said that the object looked to be about 5ft in size, and making allowance for the distance it was from the town, he figured that it must have been 15 or 20ft in diameter, though that was just a guess. Wilmot said that he heard no sound, but that Mrs. Wilmot said she heard a swishing sound. For a very short time, the object came into view from the southeast and disappeared over the treetops in the general vicinity of Six Mile Hill. Wilmot, who's one of the most respected and reliable citizens in town, kept the story to himself, hoping that someone else would come out and tell about having seen one, but finally today decided that he would go ahead and tell about seeing it. The announcement that the RAAF was in possession of one came only a few minutes after he decided to release the details of what he had seen. Thus ends the article. The consequence of this supposed coincidence, a mysterious object recovered on a New Mexico ranch and a respected local couple claiming to have seen a flying saucer, sparked one of the most infamous moments of high strangeness hysteria in American history. It is, of course, the Roswell Incident. The event has been affirmed and debunked countless times by believers and skeptics alike. It has been the subject of dozens of documentaries on the Discovery Channel and History channels that we all probably watched and loved. To this day, it remains a favorite point of discussion for the UFO community. But our purpose here is not to debunk or confirm the many narratives that have grown out of Roswell. Instead, our focus lies on something that emerged from it many years later. In 1995, Fox TV aired a special program titled Alien Fact or Fiction? Viewers tuned in expecting what the title suggested a fiction? A show, just another paranormal drama or speculative pilot. What they did not expect and what they did receive was found footage that purported to show an actual autopsy of a real, deceased alien. The scene opens with grainy blue coloration on a sterile and nearly empty room. The floors are tiled and the walls appear to be stippled vinyl. Though the lights overhead cannot be seen, it's clear that their glow is bright and bleach white. On one side of the room, there stands a metal closet and a small side table with books and rudimentary medical equipment. A curtain hangs in the foreground of that side. In the room's center is a drain built into the tile. An unmarked phone is mounted on the wall behind it, but on the far right of the screen, the viewer's attention is immediately captured by a cooling board on a table with wooden legs. Men, doctors prepared for surgery, stand around it. Steel trays are beside them, with various instruments organized on top. A lamp, which one could see, shines brightly on the thing which lays on the board. It is a humanoid, though it is far from human. An enlarged and hairless head gives way to enlarged eyes that are slanted and almost serpentine. They are open and black. There is no nose, only two holes where a nose should be. The mouth is disproportionately small, but it's completely agape in death. Narrow shoulders and a stout, apparently sexless body have slender arms and legs attached to it. Each hand has six fingers. Each foot has six toes. The right leg is severely wounded. It appears burned and gashed in multiple places. The doctors acknowledge the camera. One sees their mouths moving behind their masks, but no sound can be heard. They commence with a full autopsy of the being before them. They cut into the chest and peel back skin. They remove organs. Some appear similar to ours, and some appear strange. Indeed, this goes on for multiple minutes, cutting, peeling, moving, commenting silently. Finally, it's over. The being remains on the table. The doctors step out of the frame. The screen dims until it is black. Such was the footage of the alien autopsy that Fox viewers witnessed on that fateful night in 1995. A miniature frenzy erupted almost immediately. Was it real? Where did it come from? Did alien life exist? And had we studied it? Newspaper forums and televised news gave space to skeptics and ufologists alike to debate the footage. Coffee shops, bars, and parks buzzed with conversation about the legitimacy of this alleged extraterrestrial surgery. Then, after a few months, the man who possessed the footage stepped forward. Ray Santilli was a British music and film director. According to him, he had been interviewing cameramen for a film project in 1992, when he met one other particular cameraman who was retired from the United States Army. Over time, the two discovered that they shared certain interests. Of course, there was film, but they also shared a fascination with stories and events that defied easy explanation. Near the end of their collaboration, the cameraman told Santilli about a job he had once performed at an army airfield in Roswell, New Mexico. He claimed that that he had been tasked with filming a group of unknown doctors as they dissected and studied an alien creature that had crashed outside of town, presumably dying on impact. The cameraman told Santilli that he still had the footage and for reasons unknown, was willing to give it to him. Santilli gladly accepted this gift and thus came into possession of the so called alien autopsy film. As soon as Santilli revealed himself and the film's backstory, skeptical efforts to debunk the footage gained new momentum. The film lacked a verifiable chain of custody. No records existed to confirm its provenance. The army naturally refused to comment. Surgeons and pathologists critiqued the autopsy techniques shown in the film. Film experts were granted access to the original reels, and some reported discrepancies between the materials on the film and what would have been used in the late 1940s. Despite these growing doubts, Santilli maintained the film's authenticity for 11 years. But then, in 2006, he finally admitted to the hoax. But even here, there's a twist. Santilli publicly confessed that the film was, for the most part, his own creation, built with props, actors, and vintage cameras. However, he also claimed that his film was a reproduction of real footage he had been shown in the early 1990s, which he had not been able to purchase or otherwise acquire. He insisted that this version was based on something very real, something that had deeply disturbed him when he first saw it. In fact, he even claimed that a few frames in his recreation had been spliced from the original footage. Today, most believe the first part of Santilli's confidence confession that the entire thing was a staged fiction. Very few give any weight to his claim that the hoax was inspired by something real. And yet some still believe him.

[B]

Hey, Ben, I just read that our great grandparents probably experimented with butter on their dry skin as a moisturizer. Is that why you look so radiant?

[A]

Maybe it's Grandma's butter recipe. Or maybe it's gray toad tallow.

[B]

Their tallow products are 100% organic and naturally contain the good stuff your skin craves. No mystery there.

[A]

So say sayonara, Sammy to kitchen experiments. And say hello to healthier skin Greato Tallow. Trusted by skin, Envied by Great Grandma's Butter Recipe.

[B]

For more information and to get a sample pack, check out graytoadtalo.com don't forget to use the code COSMOS15. That's all caps. Cosmos 15 for 15 off your order. What is that? Did you hear that? Is that a ghost?

[A]

It's just me moaning through the pain of a terrible night of sleep and a hurt back.

[B]

Honestly, you probably just have a magnesium deficiency, which, like the fae, is a very real thing.

[A]

Well, how. Well, how do I get more magnesium? Do I start leaving offerings out to it or something?

[B]

No, you just use Humble Love's Magnesium cream. It's got no weird chemicals or demonic ingredients. It's made by a husband and wife team. Totally clean, totally safe, even for kids.

[A]

Well, at least that doesn't sound scary.

[B]

It's not. Visit the humblelifestore.com that's the humblelifestore.com and use code NCP15 for 15% off your first jar link in the description. Hey guys, this is Ray from the band out of the Graves. It's a sad fact that most of the music that I listen to seems to fall under two categories. One, it's either made by dudes who used to claim Christ 10 years ago and no longer do, or it's made by a bunch of dudes who never claim Christ at all. Here at New Christendom Press, we say that Christians should make the best art and out of the graves is part of that mission. There's a reason we call it post mill rock and roll. So if you're looking for me music to wage war on pagan art, check out out of the Graves. Anywhere you listen to music.

[A]

How many demons, ghosts or vampires are lurking in your investment portfolio? If you're invested in the s and P500, it's probably more than you think. Since it's full of companies that actively oppose your faith. Stonecrop Wealth Advisors is here to help their faith based portfolios redirect your hard earned dollars away from destructive agendas and into companies making a positive impact on society. Get the demons out of your portfolio and invest in God's kingdom while you grow your wealth. Contact Stonecrop Wealth Advisors today by visiting StoneCropAdvisors.com Haunted Cosmos investment advisory services offered through StoneCrop Wealth Advisors LLC, a registered investment advisor with the U.S. securities and Exchange Commission.

[B]

My favorite part of this whole story is how at the end the guy tries to pull like what my kids always try to pull when they're like, I did steal the cookies, but did I really steal the cookies?

[A]

The cookies were also able to be.

[B]

Stolen and like, also I. I think I bought the cookies. They just try to get until he's.

[A]

Like, let's not get bogged down with what was true and what was not.

[B]

Look, did I elaborately hoax an alien autopsy video? Yes, But I was elaborately copying a video I saw that wasn't hoax.

[A]

We live in a world where such an alien autopsy could exist.

[B]

Dude, there are people.

[A]

And so for me to make a fiction, it's real.

[B]

It's like there are people who are without hair.

[A]

Okay, Will Smith's husband.

[B]

If you don't get the reference.

[A]

Theovon.

[B]

That's all right.

[A]

Shout out to theoban. Hey, we'd love to have you on the show. Believe in Jesus Christ. You like peace and joy?

[B]

We'd love to have him. Anyway, talk about repenting and believing in Jesus Christ.

[A]

There is a added layer to the onion that is this story. You know what I'm talking about?

[B]

Peel it back.

[A]

Astonishing Legends.

[B]

No.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

It's been too. I think I listened to it once.

[A]

Okay, so I. I remember that Astonishing Legends did an episode on this, and they brought in this guy, and I can't remember his name, but he was like, an Italian costume designer and set designer, and he randomly reached out to Astonishing Legends and was like, hey, I heard you guys mention the alien autopsy thing. I didn't think people still believed in that. Like, I did all of that.

[B]

He was the guy who did the props.

[A]

He was the guy who made all the props. He acted as one of the doctors. He was like, the phone on the wall, like, didn't even have any wires, and it was just hung with a thumbtack. He. And he came on, and I don't. Like, I didn't. I didn't listen to it in preparation for this show. Maybe I should have. But I remember him having, like, pretty hard documentation.

[B]

That was him that showed that it.

[A]

Was in fact, him. Like, he had receipts that he'd been paid by Santilli.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And he was like, no, y' all don't understand. Like, he knew that it was all just fake. He just. He just wanted to do this. He wanted to do it, and he hired me to get it all done.

[B]

Like, I mean, good. Like, follow through commitment.

[A]

Oh, yeah.

[B]

Honestly, a lot of virtuous things about, like, his total fraud and lying.

[A]

Yeah, like, except for that part. It's too bad that it was, like, undergirded by this big vice.

[B]

Now, here. Here's the difference.

[A]

Eleven years, by the way. Like, dude, this man, he stood by for 11 years. He's like, y' all are all crazy. This is real.

[B]

Stop lying about me, guys.

[A]

Like, what made him Change his mind. You wake up one day in 2006.

[B]

And he was like, look to that one, brother, I gotta come clean.

[A]

That, like, was alive in 2006, that we all remember waking us up on Saturday mornings, it was like. And then you're like, I need to come clean.

[B]

I need to come clean about the aliens. It's gone too far. This is unlike, though, I want to make this distinction here, because this is not a Bob Hieronymus situation. I think Bob Hieronymus is the guy who claimed that he was in the suit in the. Yeah, the PGF in the Patterson Gimlin film. Like, the real one's called pgf. You know what I'm saying? Just like. But it might not be Bob Hieronymus. But there was a guy who said, like, no, it was Bob. I was in the suit. But then when you. You got into it, you're like, no, you weren't.

[A]

He was too short.

[B]

It didn't make any sense.

[A]

He was too heavyset.

[B]

Costume technology didn't exist.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

He described the costume wrong. From what you see on the footage, like, there are all these issues.

[A]

He also, like, gets all the dates and names wrong.

[B]

He was trying to get famous.

[A]

Yeah. He was trying to get fame. Yeah. What's that? Almost Famous with Malin A, I believe.

[B]

Don't get the reference.

[A]

Bob Hieronymous is basically what that movie's based.

[B]

But everyone knows that you're referencing are out of control.

[A]

Out of control, dude. I appreciate out of control.

[B]

No, I. I think that this one is. It's one of those pieces of pop culture. Maybe this is just millennials, but this was like a part of my childhood ethos.

[A]

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

[B]

Knowing about this story and, like, wondering.

[A]

Dude, it was like, you. You know, you're. You're. And the other thing is that I. Before I found the Astonishing Legends episode, I listened to, or I. I think I watched a documentary on, like, YouTube, and it was very convincing in trying to say, like, no, this is real.

[B]

It's a real alien.

[A]

Like, this isn't the real alien, but it's based on the real alien. Like this. You know, this is a very real thing. This is how the sausage is made when it comes to dissecting extraterrestrials.

[B]

And here's the thing that we know about that it is not true. It did not happen. And you do need to be a little bit. You know, you need to have a little bit of skepticism in you when you hear someone say, I autopsied an alien. When someone Tells you that. And then it's the same thing I have with implants. Whenever someone's like, no, they took me. I've got an. I'm not talking about implants like that they advertise on billboards in Utah, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I'm talking about, like, mommy makeovers, Mormon implants. I'm talking about alien implants. Like, when they take you and then they do all this stuff and they put a little, like, wire in your thigh or something.

[A]

It's like a little chip. Yeah.

[B]

I'm always just a little skeptical when someone says no. Like, they implanted me, and I took it out. And this is the. Here it is. And it's some, like, little bit of metal.

[A]

Terry Lovelace.

[B]

Terry Lovelace. And some of them. His, you know, they're mysterious and strange, a little bit weird, but I'm still always like, but they didn't. But I don't know, dude. I don't know. That'd be pretty. Not too difficult.

[A]

I would sooner believe that Bill Gates implanted you with a chip then.

[B]

Absolutely. Like, the other day. And by the other day, I mean, like, two summers ago, my wife and I were walking through Riverdale, Utah, where we had our domicile attack.

[A]

Not the show. Not the Archie and Jughead.

[B]

Again. His references are out of control. I don't know it.

[A]

Riverdale, Utah.

[B]

So we were walking through Riverdale, and this mosquito, you know, came up. This mosquito trying to bite me. And. And it was big. I mean, like, it was the size almost of Ben's mom.

[A]

Was it a robot?

[B]

And. Okay, he just doesn't even realize it was almost the size of Ben's mom. That was. Gold is flying next to me, and there's, like, a bunch of them, and I'm like, this is a big mosquito. It's like the size of the mosquitoes that you see up in Minnesota.

[A]

Like, huge.

[B]

And I'm looking closer at this thing, and it's got, like, blue stripes and blue and black stripes. Like a tiger, but, like a blue tiger.

[A]

Dude, tigers would be cooler if they were blue.

[B]

They would be, absolutely. Thank you for noting that. And I was. I was like, what is going on? And my wife. And if you know my wife.

[A]

Oh, yeah.

[B]

She was like, I'm telling you, I just saw this on the. Or I just heard this on this podcast. I was listening to, like, Bill Gates. He's releasing mosquitoes that have the vaccines in them, and you're about to get vaccinated. And then I did look it up, and it was a weird mosquito for Our area, like, it was a real mosquito.

[A]

But the thing is, like, Lexi says stuff like that. She's like, hey, the chemtrails, or like, they're making your hair fall out. And I believe it because my hair. My hair is falling out. And we have a lot of chemtrails here.

[B]

Here's the thing. Chemtrails are real.

[A]

They are real.

[B]

Maybe we'll do an episode at some like. Like subscribe and hit the notification bell if you want us to do an episode on chemtrails.

[A]

Let me throw this your way, listener. Tell me what you think about this. Okay. Mandalas. Yeah, you know, oh, we gotta do that. Mandalas and their ability. Their innate ability to restructure chemical solutions. Okay. Like water.

[B]

Are you talking about structured water right now?

[A]

Structured water? Living water.

[B]

Are you. Are we getting in with a little structured water?

[A]

Is water alive? That is the question that I pose in response to the alien autopsy story. The only question that comes of that, only reason. Is water alive?

[B]

And my wife says, yes, she does. She says.

[A]

She says, yes, it's alive. Yeah, it's alive.

[B]

Well, I think we all believe. We know that the listeners. One thing they want is for us to do a primary water.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Primary water is really.

[B]

Primary water. It is genuinely fascinating. Not going to get into. It has nothing to do with the alien autopsy or the topic of this show.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

But. But it is just as a teaser. I want to say before we. Before we continue in this episode with our next story, which is one of my favorite stories of, like, maybe this whole season. It's just so funny to me. It's so hilarious to me. What they pulled off.

[A]

I don't remember what. Oh, I do remember what they pulled off.

[B]

It is so great. It cracks me up how mean they were. I know, like, how mean they were. Honestly. They ruined the guy's whole existence.

[A]

Yeah. I'm about to ruin this man's whole.

[B]

Career, and he did it. Okay, before we do that, I want to say this is our last episode of season five.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Now, be. Do not be concerned, because, listener, if you're. If you're wondering right now, what am I going to do with myself while you guys are in your offseason, that's.

[A]

What I would be wondering if I.

[B]

When this episode comes out, I don't know the exact date off the top of my head at this point. You could support this show, and you could already be listening to season six. And when I say season six, I mean, like, you could definitely be listening to a lot of season six at this point.

[A]

And when he says season six, he means the sixth season of Haunted. Haunted Cosmic.

[B]

This is season five.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

The reason is that we, we produce. We've all, you know, we've released episodes early to patrons at our Sasquatch. Photographer tearing up always. But we're doing. Since season five, the season we're ending now, we actually recorded the whole of season five and released it completely by the time the first episode dropped.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Dump truck. So by the Time Season 6, episode 1 comes out to the public, the whole season will have been dropped to patrons. So they'll be able to listen in. The other thing is, dude, you look so good right now.

[A]

I know.

[B]

It's distracting. The other thing is patrons. All patrons at every level get access to two things that are worth the price of admission, which is like five bucks a month or something is the lowest tier. First of all, you get episodes ad free.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So even the lower tier, they don't get them early, but they get them ad free. And which is kind of a downgrade because our ads are elite.

[A]

Dude, we'll.

[B]

Everybody says our ads are out of control. Everybody says, Everybody's telling me. They say haunted Cosmos. Your ads are out of control. You have the best ads. The best ads. They're lag of ads. So first of all, you do get them ad free, which is a downgrade that you are paying for. But the second thing is you get access to the Dusty tome, which is a Patreon exclusive podcast. We do. And Every week it's 20 to 45 minutes, depending on the topic. And it's just like mostly completely story driven. Story driven. It is every bit as good as lore, except not infuriatingly liberal.

[A]

Yeah. You know what I mean? And I would like to think. Now let me preface this. I like Aaron Minke's voice.

[B]

Baron Spanky.

[A]

Baron. Baron Hankey.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Hanky panky. Yeah, I like it. I think that my voice is at least a Googleplex. Better.

[B]

Let's compare the physiognomy of your voice to his voice. His voice is kind of like in terms of physiognomy. Would kind of like be a dweeb character in an 80s-90s sitcom type shows.

[A]

Are wider than his shoulders.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Ben's voice. Physiognomy. Imagine the Chad meme, the triangle shaped Chad meme where the guy's got like a Googleplex and he's got traps the size of your mom. That's Ben's voice physiology.

[A]

And he's mewing like constantly Mewing.

[B]

If you don't know what that means, just Google it. So with that said, can you go into.

[A]

You're going to do it?

[B]

Can you ask me to go into next story?

[A]

Hey, with all that said, I think you learned a lot in this segment. Brian, will you take us in to the next story?

[B]

I thought you'd never ask.

[A]

Thank you.

[B]

In 1979, investigators at the McDonnell Laboratory for Psychical Research in St. Louis decided to launch a new multi year experiment in the fields of parapsychology, telekinesis and remote viewing. They called it Project Alpha, and it would go down in history as one of the most prolific hoaxes ever perpetrated. Only this time, the joke was entirely on the researchers. True believers by some of their own participants. Dr. Peter Phillips had been brought onto the McDonnell team with the aim of introducing a new level of scientific rigor and credibility to the testing already being conducted at the lab. His background was in physics, which made him naturally skeptical, but he remained open to the possibility that human beings might possess abilities that science had yet to fully understand. Eager to begin, Phillips put the word out to local groups of spiritualists and mentalists, announcing that he was seeking participants who genuinely believed that they possessed these special abilities. He received hundreds of applications over several months. He carefully narrowed down the pool pool to about a dozen individuals. Early in this process, he was contacted by the famous magician James Randi. Randy offered his assistance on the project, suggesting that his keen eye for illusion and deception would be invaluable to the otherwise inexperienced Phillips. After all, a magician could spot the frauds far more easily than a physicist. Phillips thought this was an excellent idea and brought Randy on as an advisor in constructing and running the various experiments of Project Alpha. At the same time, Randy was developing a relationship with two young illusionists, Steve Shaw and Michael Edwards. They were small time magicians looking for a mentor to help them take their acts to the next level. In talking with the two young men, complete unknowns in the world of parapsychology, Randy had an idea, a tricky idea. What if he used the two magicians as inside men for for Project Alpha? What if they could convince the researchers, using nothing more than sleight of hand and stage magic, that they were genuine psychics? Randy coached the young men and encouraged them to apply for positions in the project. He then subtly suggested to Phillips that these two seem like ideal candidates. Two young, eager men with no reputation or clout, who, according to their carefully falsified applications, wholeheartedly believed that they possessed genuine psychic abilities. Phillips accepted Randy's recommendation. And just like that, the infiltration was complete. What followed became a comedy to some and a devastating breach of trust to others. The first test was simple enough. Participants were placed in an empty room observed by Phillips and Randy. Each was given a metal spoon and instructed to bend it using only the power of their minds. Candidate after candidate failed to complete this supposedly simple telekinetic task. That is, until Shaw and Edwards took their turns. Guided by Randy, the two manipulated Phillips into believing that the test conditions were too restrictive, that their abilities could not manifest under so much external control. Phillips accepted this critique and agreed not to limit what what the boys could bring into the room. So they brought an extra spoon, one that was either already bent or could easily be bent with one hand beneath the table. During the test, they would subtly drop or obscure the real test spoon, make the switch, and present the bent spoon as the original. When Phillips examined what he believed to be the test spoon, mysteriously warped by sheer willpower, he was astonished. Encouraged, the project moved on to more difficult tasks in the same empty room. The boys were next presented with sealed envelopes. Each envelope contained a photograph over the speaker. Phillips instructed them to view the contents of the envelope with their minds and then identify the correct photograph from a lineup of a dozen or so similar images. Again, coached by Randy, the boys convincingly complained that they could sense Phillips observing them, that his mental energy was interfering with their efforts. Phillips, wanting to give them the best chance at success, agreed to leave the observation room and wait in the hallway until they were finished. But opening the envelopes wasn't simple. They had to appear untampered with. Shaw and Edwards used their fingernails to carefully straighten the bent staples, sealing each envelope. They slid the staples out, viewed the photograph, and meticulously reinserted the staples, pressing them flat again against the metal tabletop. Phillips was none the wiser. Once again, he was stunned by the boy's apparent psychic accuracy. The next test involved moving objects across a table using only the mind. For this, Phillips insisted on on observing directly. The boys responded by telling him that due to their youth and inexperience, their abilities could only influence lightweight objects. Paper, sheets of foil, maybe matchsticks. In accommodating, Phillips agreed, Randy then taught them a simple trick. By applying subtle pressure with their knees on one side of the table and using controlled breathing, they could cause the lightweight operation objects to twitch and slide in a jerky, seemingly unnatural manner. The demonstration worked. More of Phillips skepticism fell away. Finally, the boys were tasked with creating anomalous images on a thermal Imaging camera. Phillips reasoned that the young participants might not be able to manifest visible objects, but perhaps they could induce temperature shifts or other disturbances detectable in the non visible spectrum. Once again, Randy had a solution. He taught the boys how to use controlled breathing and deliberate manipulation of their own body heat, combined with small handheld magnets to distort the thermal readings and discolor the camera display. The ruse worked perfectly. Throughout it all, Randy had instructed the boys to come completely clean if they were ever asked to directly whether they were faking. But they were never asked. And so the deception continued for years. By the end of that time, Phillips believed he had gathered groundbreaking evidence. In 1983, he scheduled a press conference to announce the results of Project Alpha. Major media outlets attended, as did the lab's chief sponsor, James Smith McDonnell there. After Phillips presented his data, James Randi took the stage. He announced to the shock of the room that it had all been a hoax. He made clear that Phillips had not been in on it, that he had been an honest researcher deceived by carefully orchestrated trickery. Randy then introduced Shaw and Edwards, who openly confirmed the fraud. The moment was intended to serve as a cautionary tale, a reminder to the scientific community that extraordinary claims demand at least extraordinary rigor and that even the most well meaning researchers can be fooled. Phillips was devastated. He had been used for an object lesson and believed his career was ruined. In many ways it was. Funding for Project Alpha was immediately pulled and the research was halted. But the damage went deeper. The McDonnell Laboratory never recovered from the disgrace. It closed its doors not long after. Today, Steve Shaw performs under the stage name Banachek. He is a renowned mentalist and magician whose career is built on transparency and skepticism. He continues to educate the public, urging audiences to be slow to believe what they see. Michael Edwards, by Congress contrast, chose a different path. After Randy's grand reveal, he stepped away from the spotlight entirely. He abandoned his dream of becoming an illusionist and faded into a quiet, ordinary life. Today, no one knows where he lives or what he does. By all accounts, that is just how he prefers it.

[A]

All right, so the obviously rip to Dr. Phillips whole career, James, Randy, I mean, like that is such a heartless.

[B]

Thing to do that for years this poor guy becomes like a very good object lesson. But like what an absolute turd.

[A]

What I love is James Ranci's basically like it was all a fake. You're welcome for the moral lesson.

[B]

He's just ruining the whole laugh.

[A]

This man fades away into obscurity, like probably in shame. Impoverished, in shame. And the Whole research institute. It's over. That's why it closes. Yeah. It wasn't just one experiment, so.

[B]

But in. In. Okay, here's two things. Super rude Dr. Phillips. Peter, my guy, Dr. Peter Phillips. Two things. Number one, he never asked them if they were faking.

[A]

I know.

[B]

And James Randi told him, if he asks you directly, you come clean. Immediately you say, yep, we're faking. Here's how we do it.

[A]

Yeah. Don't now. Is it a lie of omission? Yes, absolutely. Okay. But they never actually said, yes, we are psychic.

[B]

And then secondly, he was super manipulable. Well, they did in the application. They said, we believe we're psychic.

[A]

No, they didn't.

[B]

It said in the thing that Randy coached them on their falsified admissions that they believed, like, they were presenting themselves as genuine. So psychics.

[A]

I know, but I don't think they ever said, hi, my name is Stephen Shaw. I am a psychic. I think what he said was like, hi, my name is Stephen Shaw. I'm interested in your study. I think that, you know, I have some special skills.

[B]

Evan, run back to the thing I just read and just vindicate one. One or the other of us, Whichever one, whichever one, I don't care who wins. And like, let's be honest, either way, Ben wrote that section, so.

[A]

So either it's me forgetting really funny.

[B]

Or just slightly like, it's a win win for me.

[A]

The thing. So here's what fascinates me about this whole thing.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

These two guys now. Yes. Dr. Phillips was being too credulous. Yeah. You know, he was like, I'll leave. Yeah. Oh, sure.

[B]

Oh, my psychic energy is getting in the way.

[A]

You're able to see what's inside. Because when I left the room. Okay, with all that aside, it does speak to the ability of these illusionists to genuinely make you think that they.

[B]

Are time traveling paranormal things like David Blaine, the time traveling demon.

[A]

Like David Blaine, the time traveling demon.

[B]

What else is orange?

[A]

What else is orange?

[B]

I don't know.

[A]

Jesus, look in your cup. Jesus.

[B]

That's one of the best.

[A]

No, David Blaine, no David Blaine.

[B]

One of the best early YouTube moments.

[A]

Such a great video. If you don't know what we're talking.

[B]

About, cut to it.

[A]

If it won't get us, do yourself a favor.

[B]

It's so funny. Okay. The other thing. The other thing is. This makes me think of that Criss angel guy.

[A]

Yeah, dude, like, my favorite genre.

[B]

My favorite genre is television magic because there is literally nothing that prevents it from being fake because it's on television.

[A]

They are affliction T shirt wearing, like, Hot Topic pants. Shopping magicians who think that it's cool to look like that one kid from the movie the Hangman's Curse, who by the end, like converts to Christ, but still looks pretty emo.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like the lead singer of Family4Spot. You know, these are deep cuts I'm giving Chris.

[B]

Like, everyone knows your references are out of control. Chris, Angel. What's. What's crazy about these? Elute, Criss Angel, David Blaine. Like, they genuinely are insanely impressive. What they can do.

[A]

Very talented.

[B]

It shows that we want to believe, though.

[A]

Here's the thing about David Blaine, though.

[B]

Is David Blaine genuinely.

[A]

I think that. I think that David Blaine is a demon.

[B]

See what I'm saying?

[A]

Have you ever seen the video?

[B]

There's a part of us that's like, it's too good.

[A]

No. Have you ever seen the video of him at Harrison Ford's house?

[B]

Harrison Ford in the floorboards of the.

[A]

Four Torch using way too many napkins back. And. No, I have never seen it. Okay. He go. And I don't remember what he. Oh, dude, I do remember what he does. What does he do? He walks into Harrison Ford's kitchen.

[B]

I remember this. And.

[A]

And he's like, pick a card. Any card, you know? And he does the car trick thing. Yeah. And Harrison Ford is like, you know, where'd my card go? He makes the card disappear. And he's like, dude, this is such a David Blaine thing. He's like, look in that peach.

[B]

Look in the.

[A]

This man goes in the fruit. Fruit basket. Been there since before.

[B]

The whole time.

[A]

And he, like, goes in. There's no pit in the peach. And instead there's a folded up card, and it's his card. And Harrison Ford is literally like, get out of my house.

[B]

Here's. Here's my. I think this is how that trick is done. It's too simple. And it makes us go, nah, it couldn't be. David Blaine knows he's going to do that. He knows he's going to be in the house. He has lots of resources. He 100% broke. Planted that peach through someone in the household. He bribed somebody. He got someone to put it there ahead of time. And he's really good at, you know, sleight of hand. Sleight of hand. He can get him to pick the card.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Wants.

[A]

Fair enough, fair enough, fair enough.

[B]

But. But when he does that to you, you. There's. Because you're. You're like, there's no you're like, this.

[A]

Demon just got in my house.

[B]

There's no flipping way.

[A]

Fair enough. Okay, now what about this other thing that David Blaine once did?

[B]

He lived in that ice.

[A]

He lived in ice for like a year. He fasted for, like 60 days up in a clear cube where everyone could see it, and he held his breath for 17 minutes.

[B]

That's crazy.

[A]

And I'm like, dude, sometimes, like, I think that the demons are giving him this, like, hyper human.

[B]

He also. He made a fistula in his arm.

[A]

I saw that.

[B]

So that he could put that. Like, he's actually doing some of these things. They're not illusion.

[A]

Sometimes it's just like, a lot of training.

[B]

He could put a rod through his arm muscle because he had done it enough times that it created a basically scar tissue passage that he could put it through without bleeding, which is crazy.

[A]

You just had, like, such a. Like, such a kid that's excited about. I made, like, a scar tissue passage so we can put it through without bleeding. Really?

[B]

I'm just trying to show up.

[A]

I think that we can all agree on one thing. Yeah.

[B]

What is it?

[A]

Magicians have some of the greatest names ever. Okay. David Blaine. That sounds great. Chris Angel. Are you kidding me?

[B]

James Randy. The Amazing Randy.

[A]

Harry Houdini.

[B]

Harry Houdini. Clearly a real name. James Randy didn't. J. Didn't. Was it James Randy that had the, like, million dollar challenge that if anybody could.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Demonstrate something supernatural beyond question.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

He would give a million.

[A]

He was like a super skeptical big skeptic. Yeah.

[B]

Penn and Teller. The same.

[A]

Penn and Teller do all these. Their. Their show that they did where they, like, someone performs a trick in front of a big audience and they figure it out is actually really cool.

[B]

It's way cool.

[A]

Because on the off chance that they don't figure it out. Yeah. It's one of the craziest tricks you've ever seen. Like, it's insane.

[B]

And it just shows you, like, some of the skills people have in these illusions. It is incomprehensible to me being able to do what they do.

[A]

I saw one on America's Got Talent where this. It was like a teleportation trick. Like the vanishing Teleporting man or whatever. The Prestige Reference. Yeah. And it was like, the way that he did. I know that obviously he didn't really teleport. I'm not crazy. Although. But the way that he did the lighting made it so effective because it didn't just make it seem like he teleported. It made it creepy and so it was. Everyone was kind of, like, shocked. Yeah.

[B]

And.

[A]

And were, like, clapping, but it was. You could tell people were wildly uncomfortable.

[B]

Are you ready, dude? I'm about to do the craziest thing.

[A]

Are you gonna tell?

[B]

I'm gonna teleport out of this chair.

[A]

I'm gonna teleport to this burrito in my mouth.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

You ready?

[B]

In three. Three, two, one.

[A]

Whoa. He's gone. Okay, wait, come back. Three, two, one.

[B]

What?

[A]

Hey, you know what?

[B]

I can teleport.

[A]

You know what that reminds me of? Have you ever seen those tricks that the magician plays on people where he goes to a park and he has plants? There's, like, 18 of his friends there.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And then there's one guy that's actually just at the park, and he. And he's like, I need two volunteers. And one of them is his friend.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And he sits in the chair, and the other one is the guy.

[B]

Yeah, the real guy.

[A]

Yeah. And so he does the magic trick on his friend first, where he throws the curtain over him and he makes him disappear. And, like, everyone's in on it, and everyone claps. And the other volunteer is like, he just made that guy get disappear. That's crazy. And then he puts the curtain over the. Just the normal guy, and they're all like, abracadabra. They rip the curtain off. He's still there. But they all act like he's gone and he's freaking out.

[B]

So he's like.

[A]

He's like, I'm real.

[B]

Let me come back. Do they act like you can't hear him?

[A]

Yeah, dude, it's so funny. It's. Or if you do it to a.

[B]

Kid, do they really freak out Mean, if you don't do it to a kid?

[A]

I would do it to my kids.

[B]

It'd be funny, though.

[A]

You can only do it to your own kid.

[B]

You can only do it, too, if you can convincingly do the first illusion.

[A]

This is what Paul meant when he said, don't provoke your children to wrath. He meant to do these things to them.

[B]

That is. That is so funny.

[A]

Isn't that hilarious?

[B]

That poor guy.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

He goes through the rest of his life. They just leave him.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

He thinks he's invisible.

[A]

Okay, so this episode, we've shown you a lot of frauds. You know, some people that still are a little bit too credulous, that, you know, still think maybe some of these frauds are legit. You see how the Fox sisters, they were total frauds. What did the Fox sister say? And yet their deception led to The Spiritualist Church, which is very much a demonic thing. Very demonic. But now, as we go into the hot close, we're going to explore a story that was supposed to be fraudulent, but accidentally turned into something a little bit more.

[B]

What happens when the demons take you up on your fraud?

[A]

What happens when Tasha really does come? Philip Alsford was born at Didnington Manor in England in 1624. His was a life of middle nobility, a soldier's life mixed with the culture of aristocracy. The family estate, Diddington Manor, was a beautiful home, adorned with with all the finest furnishings 17th century England could offer. It was surrounded on all sides by rolling green hills whose scent carried through every season save winter. His family was Roman Catholic, a dangerous thing in that time, and loyal to the Royalist party of King Charles I. In fact, it was as a Royalist soldier that Philip earned his stripes as a charismatic and competent leader on the battlefield. He fought with distinction at the battles of Marston Moor and Naseby, leading his cavalry into engagements that other officers may have hesitated to face. A decorated military career awaited him. But that career was cut short when Philip was only 27. His father died unexpectedly. The loss forced him into an early retirement from war and an equally early inheritance of the family estate. Though his mother and grandparents were still alive and well, they could not manage the business that had once been his father's alone. And so Philip severed ties with the army, maintaining only an advisory role, and returned to Dennington as its head. Once there, he again proved his competence, despite the social stigma of being Catholic. In an era of open persecution, Philip forged excellent relationships with the local nobility and with the common folk of the nearby village. He listened to his groundskeepers and shepherds, learned from their expertise to improve the estate's yield. Under his leadership, Diddington entered a new golden age. Everyone admired him. He soon married and he and his wife began having children. They seemed to love each other deeply, and one imagines they truly did in those early years. By the time Philip was 29, life at Diddington resembled the ending of a fairy tale. Happiness for all and every expectation that it would continue ever after. But then Margot arrived. Margot was a Romani, a gypsy who had been sold by her family into servitude in order to survive. She entered Philip's household, likely without his direct knowledge, around the time of his second wedding anniversary. But when he did notice Margot, he could do nothing but notice her. She was beautiful and exotic, kind, but not too kind. Philip admired her wit, her dutifulness and her humility, despite the hardships she had endured the two began spending more and more time together. From Margo, Philip learned many forbidden things. She was well versed in the occult at a time when magic and witchcraft were punishable by death. She held seances with him, read his fortune and taught him how to to cast charms of blessing and curse upon the land and its people. Blinded by lust, Philip consumed it all. And all the while, the two were engaged in a secret affair. Philip knew it was only a matter of time before they were discovered. He knew the affair would ruin the life he had built, that it would devastate his wife and children. He didn't care. He was selfish, consumed by overwhelming desire. Near his 30th birthday, Philip entered the manor's drawing room to find his entire family waiting for him. Their faces were solemn, angry. He knew his time was up. What followed was an ugly argument, one not worth repeating in detail. Harsh words were spoken. Actions were taken that many would come to regret. But in the end, Philip was given an ultimatum. Margot would be arrested and tried for witchcraft. Philip would say nothing in her defense. The family would bury the scandal and protect its standing in society. And so it was, or almost. Margo was tortured until she confessed to sorcery. She was publicly burned at the stake in the village square. Philip watched on from the back of the crowd. He did nothing. Afterwards, the family returned home. The love that had once existed between Philip and his wife was all but gone. The manor grew cold. His children began to resent him. The estate's yields suffered. Relations between Philip and his servant soured into outright hostility. Still, within his 30th year, Philip's depression deepened beyond what he could bear. On a cold Autumn morning in 1654, he threw himself from the battlements of Diddington. What you just heard is. Is without a doubt, tragic. In this story, everyone loses. But here is something else. Everything you just heard is completely made up. And not by me. No. The story of Philip Aylesford was fabricated by researchers at the Toronto Society for psychical research in 1972.

[B]

Why?

[A]

To study the effects of groupthink in connection with the paranormal. You see, at the time, spiritualism was enjoying a meteoric rise in popularity in the West. The more empirical schools of thought were just beginning to confront it. The researchers, Drs. George Owen and Joel Whitten, were curious about spiritualism. They wanted to know not only if such spiritual phenomena were real, but also how easily manipulated those forces might be, if they were forces at all. And so they invented a man who never lived, Philip Aylesford. They crafted his history in rich Detail. Then they gathered a test group to attempt communication with the fictional spirit of Philip. The group consisted of eight. Dr. Owen's wife, Iris, a woman named Margo Sparrow, a man named Andy and his wife Lauren, an engineer named Al, an accountant named Bernice, a bookkeeper named Dorothy, and a sociology student named Sydney. The rules were simple. The group would attempt to contact Alesford through any spiritual means they could devise. The setting was unremarkable. A brightly lit conference room with a bare table for the group to sit around. The initial seances yielded nothing of interest. The group tried holding hands, closing their eyes and all summoning Alsford quietly. While one member served as a loud spokesperson person, nothing happened. Dr. Owen then suggested changing the atmosphere to resemble a more traditional seance. He dimmed the lights. Curtains were hung to darken the room and lend it an older feel. A single candle was placed in the center of the table. With the new setting in place, the group began again. This time, something changed. Participants reported an overwhelming sense of a heavy presence. Some felt cold. Others heard whispers. All agreed they had achieved some level of contact with something. Owen and Witten were stunned. It seemed they were on the verge of proving that a group could indeed convince itself of paranormal contact with a spirit that never existed. They believed they were about to expose the fragile foundation of spiritualism. But they were mistaken. As the seances continued, the phenomena grew stranger. The researchers themselves began hearing the whispers, voices echoing faintly from the observation room. Lights flickered in response to the group's summons. The table visibly shook on the floor. Rapping sounds, deep and rough, emanated from the walls, answering questions posed to Philip. Then came the climax. During one seance, the table, in full view of both the group and the researchers, lifted itself completely up onto one leg. The participants pushed back from the table, but it remained upright, inexplicably balanced. Then, with a sudden deafening bang, the table slammed back onto the floor, only to slide violently across the room and crash into the wall, denting the plaster. Owen and Whitten and everyone present were left with no explanation for. For what they had just seen, heard and felt. Something had responded. But if it wasn't Aylesford, who never existed, then what was it? Soon after this dramatic event, the study was brought to an end. No apparition ever appeared, but the group grew increasingly fearful of what they might be communicating with. Owen closed the case, unable to provide answers, left only with many more questions. What had begun as a deliberately fraudulent paranormal experiment had transformed into something the researchers no longer understood and could not control. Beware, of calling on devils. Even devils in which you don't believe because they might just answer.

[B]

Ra.