Fascinating investigations into the Alien Abduction phenomena by a Harvard professor. Written by a Harvard professor of psychiatry, this is not a typical sensational Daily Mirror 'Aliens Sex Probe' shocker style -- it is an intellectual debate into alien abduction. Challenging stereotypes it looks at how these experiences effect the abductees and their common experiences of contact with the Divine, increased spirituality and universal love -- making it a really interesting cross-over read as it also explores the parameters of discussing spiritual experiences. * In this book there are stories from experiencers/ abductees who are: psychiatrists, shaman, school children, medicine men, photographers, estate agents, nurses, students, doctors and even a blind woman. There are three extended case studies, one from a Native American Vietnam veteran, a Brazilian shaman and a South African medicine man Credo Mutwa. He also cites people like Ken Wilber, Malidoma Some, Kerry Mullis, Stanislav Grof, Ralph Metzner, Black Elk -- who explore the cross over of physical and spiritual experiences. * John Mack likens the experiences of 'alien encounters' with other non-ordinary states of consciousness -- spiritual experiences, vision quests etc. and questions how we explain the unexplainable, how we create a language to explain experience, while looking at the differences between the material world and the spirit world and the cultures that see no distinction between them.