EVERY SPOKEN WORD
150 min read · 30,005 words- 0:00 – 5:23
Bigelow’s origin story: 1947 family close encounter near Las Vegas
- RBRobert Bigelow
(drumbeats) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience.
- JRJoe Rogan
Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (rock music plays) Hello, Mr. Bigelow.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Hello. Good morning.
- JRJoe Rogan
Good-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Or good afternoon.
- JRJoe Rogan
... afternoon. Yeah, pleasure to meet you, pleasure to get to talk to you, and I, I really appreciate you coming on here. It mean-
- RBRobert Bigelow
My-
- JRJoe Rogan
It means-
- RBRobert Bigelow
My pleasure.
- JRJoe Rogan
... a lot to me. Um, you and I have, uh, some shared interests, clearly, in the world of, uh, UFOs, but I wanna talk... M- most people know of you because of Bigelow Aerospace. They know that you're this billionaire investor and you're a s- very successful businessman, but you have a, a deep fascination with UFOs.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. Yeah, sure do.
- JRJoe Rogan
How did this all get started?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Um, back when my, uh, when I was about three years old, which would be about 1947, in actually May of that year, my grandparents had a, um, very close encounter. It was dramatic. And, um, they were taking a, an afternoon, evening drive in the late afternoon up into the mountains and then coming on back down to, to Las Vegas and they saw, um, what appeared to be at first an airplane on fire. (clears throat) And, um, i- the object became closer and closer, uh, to them and they pulled off to the side of the road and at one point then it filled up the wi- windshield and they thought they were gonna die. And at the last second, uh, it shot off and, and, uh, disappeared and, um... (clears throat) I learned of this story when I was probably 10 years old and... 'cause I was three at the time and, uh, my mother had told me this story. So I approached my grandfather and he wouldn't talk about it. Now after all these years, like seven years have gone by 'cause I was intrigued with it and, uh, (clears throat) so I went to my grandmother and she on- only would say a few words, but she wouldn't talk, so I got the story from my mom and, um, and they had... My grandfather had to sit on the side of the road there in the car for a while to, um, (clears throat) recompose himself and, uh, uh, because they thought they were, they were gonna die and, uh, and then fin- he finally was able to drive on back to Las Vegas. So that was the beginning for me.
- JRJoe Rogan
Did he ever describe what... Y- you said it looked like a plane on fire, but like w- what was the shape of it as it got closer?
- RBRobert Bigelow
I, I don't recall any kinda shape that was, that was, uh-
- JRJoe Rogan
Disguised?
- RBRobert Bigelow
... that my mother described. I don't recall that. Um-
- JRJoe Rogan
But they just knew it wasn't a plane. They knew it was something-
- RBRobert Bigelow
That's right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... something crazy.
- RBRobert Bigelow
That's right. So in the family, uh, you know, in the family, the family had an event and I lived right next door to my grandparents and the family had an event, um, that kinda started things at that date. For me, other personal things came later, but for the family, that was a big deal.
- JRJoe Rogan
So this was, you said '47?
- RBRobert Bigelow
'47.
- JRJoe Rogan
And '47 was the time of the Roswell crash, '47 was the time there was a lot of UFO activity being observed worldwide and the speculation is that this had to do with the nuclear bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and all the tests that United States had done and Russia had done and that there was a lot of interest in, in obviously in that... Well, actually Russia hadn't dropped any bombs by that time, right?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
It was after that, but th-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... that there was interest in our species by extraterrestrials 'cause they're like, "Oh, these crazy assholes are detonating nukes." Like let's, let's go take a look at them.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right. Well, you had, uh, so-called Foos Fighters during the war, these lights that were following, uh, bombers and the tail gunners were the ones that saw the most often of course and, uh, and that happened through, through the war and then, um, and then of course Roswell, but before that was Ken, Ken Arnold, right? In about-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- 5:23 – 11:51
Childhood “dreams,” abduction research, and the limits of hypnotic regression
- JRJoe Rogan
It started with this, but w- what personal experiences, if any, have you had?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Well, (clears throat) when I was probably seven or so, seven or eight, um, I used to have what I chalked up all my life to just being silly dreams and I had maybe five or six of these dreams and they... I could never make sense of them and I would be, um, laying in bed on my side and, uh, typical dream, always the same. There would be (clears throat) three short somebodies, somethings in a kind of monk-... uh, robe. And so I couldn't see any face, couldn't see any appendages. And the- these three whatevers were standing there, and they, they were not too far from my eye level, as far as the heights and so forth.
- JRJoe Rogan
So these, like, child size?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, so there's nothing in a... I was an avid comic book reader, but there was nothing in the, in the whole genre of comic books that, uh, related to that, or movies. And, uh, we didn't have television in Las Vegas till '53 or '54, and even after that it was terrible broadcasting, uh-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) .
- RBRobert Bigelow
... you know, at first. But so it made no sense to me, and, um, so over my lifetime, I never mentioned it to anybody, including my wife. You know? It's funny how you keep things, uh, secret, and, uh, just kind of for no, no good reason. Um, maybe I always be embarrassed to, to, uh, talk about it. But I finally thought, "Well," you know, "maybe it was just dreams. Maybe it was something else." And, uh, so that was a first event, personally, that I had, uh, at that time with- in the subject.
- JRJoe Rogan
When did you start to connect the idea of these tiny people, or humanlike things with extraterrestrials?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Well, years later, (clears throat) um, when I began to, uh, start my process as a researcher and as a student, um, in the subject, uh, and began to talk with people who were... who made it their business to be experts in abductions. And, uh, (clears throat) the more I got into the field and, uh, uh, sat writing out questions, uh, for the researcher, for the, uh, therapist who would be asking the questions and, and I'd be sitting there watching the process. And just over time, I thought, "Well, you know, maybe there was something more to it?" But, um, uh, "I'm better off not knowing anything, so I'll just block it off and forget about it."
- JRJoe Rogan
You know, we, we talked last night about John Mack a little bit, uh, the Harvard, uh-
- RBRobert Bigelow
No, great guy. Yeah. Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
And he did a lot of, uh, these sort of, uh, hypnotic regression sessions with people where they described very similar scenarios.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Uh, well, yeah, a multitude of different situations. Uh, um, (clears throat) the abduction phenomena was, was, um, uh, very proliferate in, in the population, it seemed like. Um, even... We did a, a survey called the Roper Poll, and, uh, we repeated it three times so that the margin of error was really reduced to, like, one, one and a half percent. And, um, abduction researchers came up with, uh, the 10 questions. And, uh, so (clears throat) they... we distributed that, um, uh, and (clears throat) the, the conclusion was a, a fairly, relatively sizable percentage of the population had some kind of experiences, according to them, according to the researchers, and according to the poll. Um, I do- I am not qualified to speak to the accuracy of whether the questions were that relevant to the conclusions or not, uh, but that's what they said. And, uh, so... And I had, in my own research, found people that I put them through a regression. Uh, not personally, but I found a hypnotherapist that could do that, and I found a number of people just here or there, scattered around, uh, maybe even somebody on my own staff, and, uh, they would come up with these, these stories and these events.
- JRJoe Rogan
One of the criticisms of John Mack and hypnotic regression in general is that the idea that you can put, um, the idea that you can put a memory into someone's head, that you could suggest things and you could create false memories. And this was something that I've read in cr- the criticism of his work, that this style of-
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) .
- JRJoe Rogan
... hypnotic regression and bringing up these very specific scenarios to a bunch of different people, you can sort of help create, especially in, uh, people that are easily influenced or pe- peop- people that are open to suggestion, you could put these false memories in their head. And so, you know, e- especially when you're dealing with something as fantastic as, uh-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right. Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... a UFO or alien abduction or, or visitation or something like that.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right. Oh, that's definitely possible. Um, there's also something called screen memory, but dealing with, at first, the power of suggestion. That's absolutely true. But my experience was with, uh, different hypnotherapists, they went out of their way, uh, in fact, to su- may- if they did make a suggestion, it was just the opposite. They might say, "Okay, you're on board this craft." Um, you know, "Where's the, uh, where's the lighting coming from? Is it coming from the corner or... of the, of the room that you're in?" Well, there were no corners, and they'd be corrected ri- right away by the person being, uh-
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
... hy- hypnotized. And, uh, so they went just the opposite direction on purpose to makes it- make suggestions (clears throat) to maybe coax the person to come that direction, and they wouldn't do it.
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
The person wouldn't do it. Now, screen memory is different, uh, supposedly if somebody has a very close encounter, um, with supposedly somebody that's, that's ET, uh, (clears throat) you leave that, uh, that, uh, the memory turns out to be entirely different. And that's put into you consciously, and you recall something entirely different than what actually happened.
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Maybe you, you saw deer, two deer on the road-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
... or something of that sort, uh, or maybe there were owls or whatever. So, um, you know, that's what's purported to be.
- 11:51 – 16:04
Patterns across classic abduction cases and early modern UFO sightings
- JRJoe Rogan
What's crazy to me is, if you go back to Betty and Barney Hill, if you go to Travis Walton-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... if you go a lot of these-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... abduction experiences, people that did not know each other, and particularly, we're talking about before social media, before any of this stuff.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
They have very similar stories. Like, similar to...... a, a, a disturbing extent.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah, well, Betty, Barney... Uh, Betty and Barney Hill was, uh, accidental.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RBRobert Bigelow
You know? (clears throat) I think somebody had, uh... Betty or Barney had a, a sleep problem, and they went to try to get some therapy for a sleeping disorder. I think s- there was some kinda connection like that-
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
... but it didn't have to do with, "Oh my gosh, we have this recollection." The story evolved through the therapy.
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
You know? And, and in order to try and per- to fix this other problem, all of a sudden, this story starts just to flow out. And so, I don't know whether it was Betty first and then Barney later, and I think Barney resisted, uh, going under hypnosis, I believe. And then everything just started pouring out, so...
- JRJoe Rogan
There's a woman named Angela Hill, she's a top UFC fighter, and she's actually the granddaughter of, uh, Betty and Barney.
- RBRobert Bigelow
No kidding.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's crazy. And I didn't know about it until after we did-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Wow.
- JRJoe Rogan
... a conversation.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
I was interviewing her, just talking to her about her fighting career.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
And at the end of the conversation, she... Like, when we were done, wrapping up and about to leave, she's like, "Oh, I forgot to tell you." And then she tells me-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Wow.
- JRJoe Rogan
... that her grandparents-
- RBRobert Bigelow
(grunts)
- JRJoe Rogan
... were Betty and Barney Hill.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Oh, my God. That's, that's amazing.
- JRJoe Rogan
What? That was her grandfather, which is just-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Did you, did you inquire? Did you ask her?
- 16:04 – 26:23
Modern pilot reports, the ‘no propulsion signature’ problem, and Phoenix Lights
- JRJoe Rogan
And actually, while we were out eating dinner last night, um, Dan Crenshaw sent me a text, and I shared it with everybody at the table. And it's from American Airlines pilots that saw some-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... spectacular sighting-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... over the last couple of days.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
And, uh, they're, you know, trying to figure out what the hell these people saw. But something that sped by them at some insane rates of speed and you... there's a recording of them discussing it.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. (clears throat) Whether it's, uh, (clears throat) abnormal or conventional, um, that should never have happened in that proximity to that aircraft.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right? So if it were an accident, that's a really bad accident-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
... to have come that close. And, uh, if it were flying in the d- in the line of flight and it sped that fast over its head, then it was really moving.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. Well, w- does a conventional, uh, commercial aircraft go 400 plus miles an hour? American Airlines pilot reports seeing UFO. An American Airlines pilot reported seeing a long-
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) .
- JRJoe Rogan
... cylindrical object flying right over the top of the plane as he was flying. Um, Sunday's American Airlines Flight AA2292 was operating from Cincinnati to Phoenix using an Airbus-
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat)
- JRJoe Rogan
... A320 aircraft over the northeast portion of New Mexico at 37,000 feet. During what was otherwise a routine flight, one of the pilots contacted Air Traffic Control at Albuquerque Center. He said, "Do you have any targets up here? We just had something go right over the top of us. I hate to say this, but it looked like a long cylindrical object that almost looked like a cruise missile type of thing moving really fast right over the top of us."
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. So what's mi- missing is propulsion signature.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right? So they... That should have been evident that, uh, it had some kind of propulsion.
- JRJoe Rogan
That you could see the burners. Yeah.
- RBRobert Bigelow
The exhaust. Some kind of exhaust was, was going on, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RBRobert Bigelow
You would think, um, that they could detect that if it were in the line of sight, if they were... if they were behind it.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, that's a very short description though. I mean, maybe it did have some sort of propulsion that they s- they saw.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
That's all we saw. I mean, maybe there's a report-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... that'll come out where they describe it in detail. That's just them calling it in, right?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. If it's not super unique, then it was one hell of a mistake, right? (laughs)
- 26:23 – 26:54
Bigelow’s ‘mission’: building wealth to fund UFO and space pursuits
- JRJoe Rogan
You didn't care?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Uh, I had... I had a little plan I was following that I had put together when I was a kid. And I was on a mission, uh, to be in business to acquire resources so that I could someday have fun chasing this stuff.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, that's, that's one of the more interesting things about you. Like, you became, like, a hotel tycoon and a real estate c- tycoon, gathered up all this money so that you could study (laughs) UFOs.
- RBRobert Bigelow
And, and do f- fun things maybe in space.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, well you've-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- 26:54 – 38:21
Bigelow Aerospace: expandable habitats, ISS hardware, and how they’re engineered
- JRJoe Rogan
... also been involved in creating shelters and structures that p- people can actually live in in space.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Th- those are the genesis and the genesis-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Well, we call it a B330 is, uh, what we have in our, our plant right now is, uh, (clears throat) Engineering Units, uh, which are flight units as far as hull and bulkheads are concerned and longerons and, um, so we had to shut down because of the COVID and, um, and... but we have very advanced structures.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, and these have been implemented too. Some of them have actually been... You've actually put these things-
- RBRobert Bigelow
We, we have a TRL9 because we have a structure, scale, a structure, um, that's on the ISS now.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. So, you're dream in a lot of ways of getting involved in aerospace and in, in space travel, like, you're... This is real. Like-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... you're a guy who actually has contracts with, you know, big government-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Not that I've ever made money back.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. (laughs)
- RBRobert Bigelow
You know, it's been a bottomless pit.
- JRJoe Rogan
Has it been?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah, sure.
- JRJoe Rogan
So you've just done it as a passion?
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) On a, on a, uh, maybe a hope and a prayer, you know, kind of thing. Hail Marys.
- JRJoe Rogan
And part of it is because of your obsession with extraterrestrials?
- RBRobert Bigelow
I'm not s- I don't know. I don't know. Um, probably, (clears throat) there probably is a connection there because you're made aware that there is a whole lot more out there than what we know and, and, uh, what people think. So that could... They are. There probably is a connection. Was, always was.
- JRJoe Rogan
Do you have any images of that? See, let's pull it up so people could see what we're talking about, the stuff that you've created. Yeah, so this one... Can you explain this?
- RBRobert Bigelow
So that's an, that's an older version that we did quite a long time ago. Um, we have a full scale. That's a, that's just a one third scale. Uh, basic architectural features and accommodations for, for living. Um...
- JRJoe Rogan
Space habitat.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Okay, down... Yeah, I think those are f- those are full scale, uh, architectural renderings. Now, down at the bottom... Ka... Okay, so, um, (clears throat) that's full scale.
- JRJoe Rogan
That one right there?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. That's an old version, but that's a full scale. That's 330 cubic meters and, um, it's a, it's a more crude mockup than what we have now. And the standard, uh, volume on a module for the ISS is about 120... Or the largest is around 120 cubic meters, so 330 is about, you know, three, almost three times that.
- JRJoe Rogan
So when you design one of these things or when you go into business to create one of these things, how... What, what's the steps that are, you're taking? Are you... Do you contact engineers? Do you bring in, uh... I mean, how do you, how do you decide that you wanna go into business to make these things and how do you go about implementing it?
- RBRobert Bigelow
So, (clears throat) you know, we... It was... It's been a 20-year process and, um, at first you try to, uh, try to engineer... Um, I, in fact, I... Uh, nothing about, about the origination was original with me because I became, um, incredulous about what NASA had done in the, uh, in the early '90s, uh, with the- something called the Transhab and, uh, it was a vehicle to take people to Mars. And Congress cut the funding for that. Um-And, uh, oh my god, how could they do such a thing? Because it was very apparent, apparent that, that, that craft was, uh, really cool for a lot of reasons. And so I started the company, started putting money in it and started going after that. And then after about three years, acquired, um, a license, exclusive license to use their patent for, (clears throat) just for the enclosure. No book of instructions came with it. There wasn't a manual saying, "Here's how you do this." And so we started from scratch. And we had no assistance from NASA whatsoever in, in, in arranging architectures and engineering. And then through a process of trial and error and testing and testing and testing, destructive testing, um, long duration leak tests. Uh, destructive because you had to, to try to quantify the, the strength of, uh, (clears throat) of the materials. And we were using factors much more demanding than the factors for metallics. Um, factors of four instead of metallics maybe one and a quarter or something. And, uh, uh, and (clears throat) we finally engineered envelopes that were, uh, very durable ballistically. Uh, we did a lot of what's called hyper velocity impacts, uh, uh, tests where you shoot a particle at about seven kilometers a second, six to seven, uh, depending on the type of gas gun you're using, and, uh, seeing how well the structure can defend against something going that fast. Um, actually, the defense on something going fast is easier than a particle going slower, like a bullet, for example. Uh, kinda crazy but for some reason that, that, uh, uh ...
- JRJoe Rogan
And when you mean defense, you mean something like micrometeors or space-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah, actually-
- JRJoe Rogan
... junk?
- RBRobert Bigelow
... smaller than that, you know.
- 38:21 – 43:54
NASA as ‘the game in town’—and why mainstream science avoids UFOs
- JRJoe Rogan
And so this allowed you to... I mean, the- these contracts, if you're doing with the ISS, are they with NASA or like who... Is that who you, you work with?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah, NASA's basically has been the only game in town for us and for most folks. Most folks in the rocket business, um, you know, other than for the Air Force who buys launches for satellites, NASA is the game still. And when NASA's financially hurting, everybody hurts. Um, depending upon who, who is, uh, providing the leadership, uh, both in Congress and in NASA and in the White House, you can do fantastic things, so it's all a combination of whether or not people can all work together. If they're fighting i- in Congress and going on, you're not gonna get much. You're not gonna go, go places like you could.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. So with you being involved in this and creating these habitats and your long-standing obsession with UFOs and potential alien life, getting involved with NASA must have been pretty exciting. You're like, "Well, maybe I'm gonna learn something now."
- RBRobert Bigelow
Oh, definitely. You're definitely gonna learn. Absolutely. Um, they have a lot of good people and, uh, very, uh, expert people, so you're gonna learn a lot. It's a great place to, to sponge all that you can. Uh-
- JRJoe Rogan
I mean learn things about UFOs and alien life.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Oh, that.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- RBRobert Bigelow
Oh, that. Oh, no, I'm- I was back, I was back about, you know, space, conventional space travel.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, that too.
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) Basically-
- JRJoe Rogan
What better way to learn?
- RBRobert Bigelow
... you're not gonna learn anything about UFOs and ET from (clears throat) the vast, vast, vast, vast majority of the scientific community, and that includes NASA and everybody else.
- JRJoe Rogan
Are they not interested?
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) I think it's a combination of things. I think the reason for that is not because they're not, not interested, and a lot of people are, 'cause I'm asked things all the time. A lot of people are. I think there's always the concern of embarrassment. I, I think they're not in a position to be an investigator. They might have a passion and wanna do that, but it takes time. It takes time and effort to go do those things, and usually you wanna stick to what your career is, right? So, um, and maybe they, they've had somebody in their family that has had a tremendous story, and so, um, they'll carry that with them, and they might be, uh, they might buy the books they keep at home. They might brown bag it, you know?
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Not bring it to the lunch at commissary where other people can see what you're reading.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Uh, you know? So it's all different kinds of things because everybody's different, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
So there's kind of a- maybe a shame or something along that line involved in pursuing ex- extraterrestrial ideas?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Not as much as it used to be.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Now, it was much worse 20, 30 years ago.
- JRJoe Rogan
What was it like then?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Well, as I could speak to, to, you know, just the general, um, science population was much more, uh, reticent to, to talk about, uh, UFOs 30 years ago, I think, than today. There's been so much more exposure, uh, on the media.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
So, um, 'cause you have reg- regular television program now on aliens, ETs, ancient aliens, whatever, doesn't matter. It's all over the place compared to 25 years ago. So it's a wh- it's a different kind of world. But, um, um... The thing about the UFO, ET subject, as you continue to do research and, and work in that whole community, is, um, a kind of a strange frustration about acquiring a little bit of a taste of understanding about the possibilities of locomotion, of movement, and where we are, that we're still working with fire engines, you know? Um, and thank God for people like Elon, um, and, and Jeff Bezos. Um, I, I really respect those guys and, uh, including Elon's secret weapon, Gwen, you know? His president. Um, those are... The, the country is so lucky to have them. But the, the dynamicism of UFOs and ETs is so overwhelming.... as to what that world is like. And if it's all true, or even some of it true, it's more than just a holy cow. It's, "Oh, my God." You know? So it's like night and day comparison.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RBRobert Bigelow
And, and here we are still in 2021 and, um, still waiting to get back to the moon.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, I think when we s- we were talking earlier about The New York Times article, I think that was a, a real, um, a pivotal moment in th- the culture's acceptance of the concept of these things. 'Cause when you see something like, uh, printed on the front page of-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- 43:54 – 47:25
Tic Tac UAP and the ‘consciousness-operated’ craft hypothesis
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yes. And Leslie Kean, the journalist that did-
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
... that article-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yes.
- RBRobert Bigelow
... did a terrific job.
- JRJoe Rogan
Fantastic job. Yeah.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. Oh, just fantastic, portraying the-
- JRJoe Rogan
And it's a dangerous subject for someone.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah, it is.
- JRJoe Rogan
'Cause you're-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... you're open to ridicule, and-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Sure.
- JRJoe Rogan
But the preponderance of evidence had gotten to the point where there was enough out there we could say, "Listen, this is not something to be mocked anymore. There's something to this."
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right. That's right.
- JRJoe Rogan
So-
- RBRobert Bigelow
When you have, when you have like Commander Fravor, uh, and, and we hired Doug, uh, th- uh, one of the pilots there, um, we learned about that in '08. The event happened in '0-, '04. Um, so you have really credible people seeing something that's totally anom- anomalous and has no business doing what it's doing.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
So you gotta take it really seriously.
- JRJoe Rogan
Not only that, things that have been tracked by instrumentation, things that have gone from w- it's like 80,000 feet above sea level to one foot in less than a second, and then traveled to the, the, the agreed upon, uh, destination where the, the plane was gonna go later.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Like th- they knew, it knew where they were traveling to.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
It was able to travel at an insane rate of speed that's not even... it doesn't make any sense with any technology that we've ever even theorized.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Nope. No.
- JRJoe Rogan
So these are, these are things that were tracked by instrumentation.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
So it's not this is the best instrumentation.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
This is instrumentation that's used by the United States military to protect the borders. This is all the real shit. So when you read things like that in The New York Times, everybody has to kinda go, "Huh."
- 47:25 – 1:04:09
Psi phenomena: PK claims, remote viewing, and Bigelow’s confidence in government programs
- RBRobert Bigelow
Well, and our physics, physics is incomplete, in my humble opinion, because it doesn't provide answers (clears throat) for all the paranormal baske- not, not just what we're talking about with ET and UFOs, but all the, all the other kinds of stuff that is done in, has been done in laboratories for many, many years on camera, uh, by, by people, um, that have performed really strange things-
- JRJoe Rogan
You mean like quantum mechanics and-
- RBRobert Bigelow
No, no.
- JRJoe Rogan
... things like that?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Like micro-macro PK. So let me just take something simple.
- JRJoe Rogan
What is that?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Well-
- JRJoe Rogan
Micro-macro PK?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Just, just manipulating, um-
- JRJoe Rogan
(clears throat)
- RBRobert Bigelow
... material objects, whether they're electrons and, and so, uh, or, or a bottle cap. And so you're... (clears throat) Let's say you've got a s- a screen computer and, um, you've got a, it's hooked up to a random event generator and which is flipping a, a coin, m- you know, many, many hundreds of thousands of times a second. And it's establishing a firm (clears throat) , even line that's 50/50 across your screen. And then there's another line coming along, and your challenge is to, is to (clears throat) have the two lines deviate. So you're, you're... And I don't know, I've, it's been so many years since I, I, uh, was in the PARA lab with Bob John and, and Brenda Dunn. I forget the exact details on this. But the point was there was a line that was created and a second line that you were to think about and try to deviate that line. And you should not be able to do that at all. So they had maybe a ones flat line on the screen, and then you had this random event generator that should be 50/50 right alongside that same line.... but it's not. You're causing it to go up, or you're causing it to go down. And they had a lot of people successful on this, many, many, many. And they did just hu- too- huge number of trials that were successful. So, that's in the smallest context. You had, um, what was that Russian woman? Kalina, something like that was her name, that worked with objects in a bell jar. And, um, she would be able to manipulate them, cause them to spin, t- cause them to lift. And-
- JRJoe Rogan
Objects? What kind of objects?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Small objects. You know, something s- something small, like-
- JRJoe Rogan
Microscopic? Like how small?
- RBRobert Bigelow
No, no, no. No, like a bottle cap, you know? Something that size.
- JRJoe Rogan
So, some sort of telekinesis?
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) Um, macro PK. So, you're... It's a, it's a, it's some kind of a consciousness connection that is causing the effect, that effect on that object.
- JRJoe Rogan
Now, this is something that's been filmed?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
So, this woman is doing what? How does-
- RBRobert Bigelow
And she, she died at a relatively young age. Her heart, they said, would go up to, like, 180 beats or 90 beats a minute. And I think-
- JRJoe Rogan
While she was doing this?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. And I... She was just as-
- JRJoe Rogan
So, this is this lady?
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) Oh, your guy is good.
- JRJoe Rogan
He's the best.
- RBRobert Bigelow
He is the best. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
So, what is she doing here?
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) Well, she's-
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow, this is, like, really old stuff, huh?
- 1:04:09 – 1:09:16
Underwater UAP and Ingo Swann’s ‘submarine followed by something else’ story
- RBRobert Bigelow
It's, it's really amazing. There's an old story, uh, about, uh, Ingo Swann. He's passed over, but, um...
- JRJoe Rogan
How can you say that he passed over?
- RBRobert Bigelow
He was be- he's, he's been-
- JRJoe Rogan
You don't say he's passed. He's passed over. Like he's gone.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Well, now, you know, where my, my-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RBRobert Bigelow
... thought is about things.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, I kn- I do know where your thought is about things, but I just wanna... I, uh, 'cause... I'm gonna get to that too.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Okay.
- JRJoe Rogan
But, but the way you describe it, he passed over.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Oh, there's a story I love about Ingo, Ingo. He's being tested, as always happens. You're trying to verify, verify, verify, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Trust, but verify, verify always. And, like, you're doing exactly what you should be doing, is questioning, always questioning it. And, um, so he's being tested by officials, and, uh, they have a submarine that, uh, (clears throat) that is his target. He doesn't know what his target is, of course. And, um, it might even have been a blind or double-blind situation. I don't know. Uh, but they go to a lot of effort so that maybe even the person that's with you doesn't know what the target is. That's usually the kind of protocols. So, um, and he identifies the sub. He identifies the sub accurately, and this is a, a advanced sub that he's identifying. So it's underwater. It's, you know, it's deep. And he's able to see this thing and describe it, so it makes him pretty uneasy, and they're impressed. This is like, "Wow, this is a big deal, this guy." So it's not like just, "How is he doing this?" It's like, "He did this."
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
So they're calling the meeting kinda to a close. He says, "Well, don't, don't, don't you wanna know what's following it?" Duh, right? See, he's just... Then he starts describing this other craft that's following behind the sub. Um, Ingo was a amazing guy. I got a chance-
- JRJoe Rogan
What was the other craft?
- RBRobert Bigelow
I, I guess it was, uh, some kind of a UFO, something else that wasn't another sub, you know, of ours or, or Russians or anybody's.
- JRJoe Rogan
That's one of the speculations about, um, unidentified flying objects, is that they're not just flying, that some of 'em actually exist underwater. There's been many sightings of things that went into the ocean.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
What do you think of that?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Well, I mean, like, you know, supposedly didn't, uh... Aren't there stories even about Christopher Columbus' crew and so forth seeing things, uh, uh, going back for centuries, things coming in and out of the water?
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Um...
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, there was part of the Tic Tac, the, uh-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... Commander David Fravor's-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah, yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... encounter-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... that there was something below the surface of the water that was creating a wake, almost like rocks.
- 1:09:16 – 1:26:22
Bob Lazar: Bigelow’s interactions, ‘Mylar balloon’ desert trip, and credibility calculus
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. Um, you had, uh, you had encounters with Bob Lazar. You, you know Bob and you, you were around when Bob Lazar first, uh-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Now is this gonna be all about the Mylar balloon event?
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) What's the Mylar balloon event?
- RBRobert Bigelow
Oh, you don't know that one?
- JRJoe Rogan
No.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Uh, so, (clears throat) we all jump in my car to go out to, to the Alien Inn area out there, you know, on, uh...
- JRJoe Rogan
The Alien Inn is that, uh-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Out there.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, it's like a-
- RBRobert Bigelow
North of-
- JRJoe Rogan
... a bar or something.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yes, for, north of that area. And so, (clears throat) so Bob (clears throat) Lazar, um, George Knapp, myself, and I think Gene Huff, who was Bob's friend, we all go out there. Well, unbeknownst to me, Bob has a Mylar balloon which really bounces the radar signature a lot for its size, (clears throat) and a bottle of gas, uh, helium. So, uh, we, we find our way back out in the desert out there and we're kind of... I'm thinking we're on a, uh, a UFO watch, which is always fun. Sometimes the best thing is the food you take along, right? And you're out there under the stars and it's nice and you have a good time just watching. So, (clears throat) but, um, there's a rustle of things going on here. And, and next thing I know there's a balloon, this Mylar balloon is inflated and (clears throat) there's a slight breeze and Bob lets it go. And we're on the opposite side of the mountain range from, uh, supposedly S4. And he wants, he wants to go that way. Thank God (clears throat) the wind was going in the opposite direction. It was traveling north instead of south, and it went the wrong way, you know. So I'm thinking, my life's just passed before my eyes.
- JRJoe Rogan
Why do you think your life passed before your eyes? 'Cause if the balloon-
- RBRobert Bigelow
It does, it does.
- JRJoe Rogan
... goes towards Area S4-
- RBRobert Bigelow
It's gonna get picked up, yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... and then they're gonna go find out-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... where it came from.
- RBRobert Bigelow
And Wackenhut security is gonna come get us and-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
... I'm gonna spend the night in jail. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RBRobert Bigelow
So, you know, it all just unraveled real quick.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right. And was this before Bob had gotten in trouble for bringing people to the observation point to watch? 'Cause let's, let's tell a story about Bob real quick. Bob said he worked for Area S4 and he was hired to back engineer what they believe were alien crafts. Along the lines, he had this, uh, top secret clearance, and along the lines of all this happening, they're monitoring his phone calls. Turns out Bob's wife is having an affair. Bob doesn't know about this. They remove him from the project 'cause they believe he'll be emotionally unstable if he's... An- and so he's, he's freaking out, not knowing, A, that his wife is having an affair, not knowing why he's pulled from this project. Doesn't totally understand, so he starts telling people about what he's doing and telling people, "Listen, I can take you to a place where once a week they do these tests." So he starts bringing people to this area. They see these objects flying in these spectacular ways that we really can't do with any of our conventional aircrafts, and then Bob gets in trouble for that. Then Bob goes on the George Knapp Show and starts explaining all these different things, presumably for self-preservation, because he... The best way to pri- probably protect your own life is to go public with this and explain everything-
- RBRobert Bigelow
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... that's happening. And they could discredit you and make you look very nut, but if they kill you, then, you know, then it le- leads credence to your story.
- RBRobert Bigelow
Yeah, it gives you a very, uh, huge hardship if they kill you, yes.
- JRJoe Rogan
So when do you, when do you fall into the story?
- RBRobert Bigelow
(clears throat) Well, you've just given me an overload of information now-
Episode duration: 3:08:07
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Transcript of episode xPbZ19A03Hw
