:Cryptoterrestrial hypothesis

During the late 19th century, a variety of authors promoted ideas of an undiscovered superior civilization, variously located in mythical places such as Shambhala, Atlantis, Lemuria, or inside a hollow earth. In 1864, Jules Verne's novel Journey to the Center of the Earth imagined a hidden world beneath the Earth's surface.{{cite journal|last1=Lomas |last2=Masters |last3=Case |first1=Tim |first2=Brendan |first3=Michael |date=Jan 7, 2024 |title=The cryptoterrestrial hypothesis: A case for scientific openness to a subterranean earthly explanation for Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena |via=ResearchGate |doi=10.29202/phil-cosm/33/3

|doi-access=free |journal=Philosophy and Cosmology|issue=33|pages=67–122|url=https://static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2024/06/ThecryptoterrestrialhypothesisLomasetal.J2024.pdf}}Per Lomas et al: "Indeed, the notion of cryptoterrestrials has a long pedigree. For a start, it has often been imagined that mysteries may be concealed within the Earth, such as deep caverns, as memorably captured in literature by Jules Verne (1864)". In 1871, the novel The Coming Race was published anonymously; it discussed a subterranean superhuman race with psionic powers. In subsequent years, Theosophy founder Helena Blavatsky spread tales of superhuman masters hidden in the mountains of Tibet. In the ensuing decades, occultists alleged the existence of secret superhuman societies in a variety of mythical places including Shambhala, Atlantis, Thule, Hyperborea,William Fairfield Warren, in his book Paradise Found – The Cradle of the Human Race at the North Pole (1885), presented his belief that humanity originated on a continent in the Arctic called Hyperborea. Mu, Lemuria, or even the interior of a Hollow Earth.A Journey to the Earth's Interior, Marshall Gardner, Mokelumne Hill Pr, 1974 Edition, {{ISBN|0-7873-1192-8}}The 1892 novel Goddess of Atvatabar discussed utopian advanced civilization with flying machines and airships inside a hollow Earth.{{cite book |last1=William R. Bradshaw |title=The Goddess of Atvatabar |date=1892 |publisher=Arno Press |isbn=9780405062797 |pages=63, 100, 139–144 |url=https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32825/32825-h/32825-h.htm |access-date=Jan 18, 2024 |author1-link=William R. Bradshaw }}

In his 1895 novel The Time Machine, H.G. Wells wrote about Morlocks, a hidden, subterranean race of technological humanoids who feed on helpless surface-dwellers.The Time Machine was noted for its similarity to The Coming Race The 1933 novel Lost Horizon and its 1937 film adaptation depict Shangri-La, a Tibetan paradise inhabited by peaceful, nearly-immortal people. The 1935 serial The Phantom Empire starred Gene Autry as a singing cowboy who stumbles upon an ancient subterranean civilization living beneath his own ranch.

File:Amazing stories 194503.jpg

During the mid-1940s, an obscure sub-culture developed around the science-fiction magazine Amazing Stories and its tales of Richard Sharpe Shaver, claimed to be non-fictional.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-mMtqtZMoNYC|title=War over Lemuria: Richard Shaver, Ray Palmer and the Strangest Chapter of 1940s Science Fiction|first=Richard|last=Toronto|date=April 25, 2013|publisher=McFarland|isbn=9780786473076 |via=Google Books}} Since 1945, the magazine had published Shaver's claims to be in communication with subterranean beings concerned about atomic pollution who piloted disc-shaped craft.

In the October 1947 issue of Amazing Stories, editor Raymond Palmer argued the flying disc flap was proof of Richard Sharpe Shaver's claims. That same issue carried a letter from Shaver in which he argued the truth behind the discs would remain a secret.{{Cite web|url=http://archive.org/details/Amazing_Stories_v21n10_1947-10_cape1736|title=Amazing Stories v21n10 (1947 10) (cape1736)|date=October 1947 |via=Internet Archive}} Shaver wrote:

{{blockquote|The discs can be a space invasion, a secret new army plane — or a scouting trip by an enemy country...OR, they can be Shaver's space ships, taking off and landing regularly on earth for centuries past, and seen today as they have always been — as a mystery. They could be leaving earth with cargos of wonder-mech that to us would mean emancipation from a great many of our worst troubles— and we'll never see those cargos...I predict that nothing more will be seen, and the truth of what the strange disc ships really are will never be disclosed to the common people. We just don't count to the people who do know about such things. It isn't necessary to tell us anything.}}

After Shaver's death in 1975, his editor Raymond Palmer admitted that "Shaver had spent eight years not in the Cavern World, but in a mental institution" being treated for paranoid schizophrenia.{{cite book | last = Ackerman | title = World of Science Fiction | page = 117 }}

File:Amazing Stories August 1946 back cover.png

On June 24, 1947, during the first summer of the Cold War, civilian pilot Kenneth Arnold gave a report of seeing hypersonic disc shaped craft flying over Washington State. Arnold's claim was reported in papers nationwide, igniting a craze of copycat reports. mainstream experts concluded the reports were caused by social contagion. By July 7, Arnold was suggesting the reports might caused by extraterrestrial spaceships.

While some interpreted UFO reports as evidence of extraterrestrials, a few authors suggested non-human terrestrials were responsible. During the 1947 flying disc craze, Theosophists like Meade Layne suggested that flying saucers came from Earth's 'etheric plane' while Hollow Earth conspiracy theorists suggested that the UFO reports were being caused by a technological civilization beneath the surface of the Earth.Flying Saucers from the Earth's Interior. Mokelumne Hill, CA: Health Research, 1960. Others suggested the UFO reports might be caused by animals indigenous to Earth's atmosphere. In the mid 20th-century, authors like Morris Jessup and Erich von Däniken suggested extra-terrestrials might have arrived on Earth in pre-historic times, a possibility depicted in the 1969 Kubrick film 2001: A Space Odyssey. In his 1956 book They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers author Gray Barker suggested the saucers might come from an inner Earth,{{cite web |last1=Mckee |first1=Gabriel |title=A Contactee Canon: Gray Barker's Saucerian Books |url=https://archive.nyu.edu/bitstream/2451/63886/2/Contactee%20Canon%20-%20Barker%27s%20Saucerian%20Publications%20-%20Final%20revision.pdf |website=nyu.edu |publisher=New York University |access-date=December 11, 2023 |pages=5, 10, 14 |date=August 28, 2018}} a connection also explored by Albert K. Bender in his 1962 book Flying Saucers and the Three Men.{{cite book |last1=Albert K. Bender |title=Flying Saucers and the Three Men |date=1962 |publisher=Saucerian Books |location=University of California |pages=194 |url=https://www.librarything.com/work/198524 |access-date=Jan 16, 2024 |quote=Were these MIB and spacemen from outer space, Inner Earth, or agents of some terrestrial government? Why did they have a secret base underneath the ice of the Antarctica? |author1-link=Albert K. Bender }} In 1960, Raymond Bernard's book Flying Saucers from the Earth's Interior further popularized the idea. Beginning in the 1970s, authors like John Keel and Jacques Vallee suggested UFO reports might be linked to supernatural beings they termed 'ultra-terrestrials'.

In his 1964 article The Nonprevalence of Humanoids, American paleontologist George Gaylord Simpson claimed that the probabilities that, if they existed, extraterrestrials life forms would be anthropomorphic are very low.{{cite journal |last1=Simpson |first1=George Gaylord |title=The Nonprevalence of Humanoids |journal=Science |date=1964 |volume=143 |issue=3608 |pages= 769–775 |doi=10.1126/science.143.3608.769 |jstor=1712603 |pmid=17782833 |bibcode=1964Sci...143..769G |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1712603 |access-date=July 14, 2023}} Alongside the implausibility of humanoid aliens by evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky, Simpson's article was discussed in Archaeology, Anthropology and Interstellar Communication a popular collection of essays edited by astrobiologist Douglas Vakoch and published by NASA in 2014.{{cite book |last1=Vakoch |first1=Douglas |title=Archaeology, Anthropology, and Interstellar Communication |date=2014 |publisher=NASA |isbn=978-1-62683-013-4 |pages=190–200 |url=https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/Archaeology_Anthropology_and_Interstellar_Communication_TAGGED.pdf}} In his 2002 book Evolving the Alien, biologist Jack Cohen argued that the classic grey alien reported in relation to alleged alien abduction, close encounters and contactees reports, is unlikely to be an extraterrestrial species.{{cite book|first1=Jack|last1=Cohen|first2=Ian|last2=Stewart|title=Evolving the Alien|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xzMdNQAACAAJ|year=2002|publisher=Ebury Press|isbn=978-0-09-187927-3}}

Political scientist and professor Michael Barkun reports that in some theories UFOs built these bases underground for security reasons but remain fundamentally extraterrestrial in origin, in other cases they are believed to be native to the inner-earth.{{cite book |last1=Barkun |first1=Michael |author-link1=Michael Barkun |title=A Culture of Conspiracy |date=2003 |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=0-520-23805-2 |page=110 |edition=1st}}

In the 2000s, author Mac Tonnies coined the term "crypto-terrestrial" to describe theoretical hidden indigenous humanoids. Tonnies compared his "Crypto-terrestrial Hypothesis" with what he termed the Null Hypothesis of UFOs, the idea that "UFOs can be universally ascribed to misidentified natural phenomena and sightings of unconventional earthly aircraft". Tonnies contrasted his cryptoterrestrial hypothesis with the 'ultraterrestrial hypothesis' of the 1970s, writing: "Keel and Vallee have both ventured essentially 'occult' ideas in cosmological terms; both ... require a revision of our understanding of the way reality itself works. But the cryptoterrestial hypothesis is grounded in a more familiar context. I'm not suggesting unseen dimensions of the need for ufonauts to 'downshift' to our level of consciousness. Rather I'm asking if it's feasible that the alleged aliens that occupy historical and contemporary mythology are flesh-and-blood human-like creatures that live right here on Earth."Tonnies 2010, quoted in Redfern 2010

Tonnies and his cryptoterrestrials were featured in the writings of fringe UFO authors like Nick Redfern, Jerome Clark, Paul Kimball, and Hal Puthoff.Redfern: Contactees (2010), Clark: Unexplained! (2012), Kimball: The Other Side of Truth (2013)

The hypothesis is sometimes also referred to as intraterrestrial,{{cite journal |last1=Whitesel |first1=Brad |title=Walter Siegmeister's Inner-Earth Utopia |journal=Utopian Studies |date=2001 |volume=12 |issue=2 |pages=92–93 |jstor=20718317 }} or inner-earth.{{cite book |last1=Clark |first1=Jerome |title=Extraordinary Encounters An Encyclopedia of Extraterrestrials and Otherworldly Beings |date=2000 |publisher=ABC-Clio |location=Santa Barbara, California |isbn=1-57607-249-5 |pages=123, 153 |url=https://ia802901.us.archive.org/19/items/ExtraordinaryEncounters_201809/Extraordinary%20Encounters.pdf |access-date=December 11, 2023}}

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The 1973 science-fiction story Chains of the Sea features apparently-extraterrestrial visitors who are essentially indifferent to humans but interact with hidden intelligent beings native to Earth.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AJxbAgAAQBAJ|title=Encyclopedia of Science Fiction|first=Don|last=D'Ammassa|date=April 22, 2015|publisher=Infobase Learning|isbn=978-1-4381-4062-9 |via=Google Books}} In the 1989 film The Abyss, deep sea divers investigating the wreck of a nuclear-armed submarine make contact with an advanced civilization indigenous to Earth's oceans.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jDgGEAAAQBAJ|title=The UFO Chronicles: How Science Fiction, Shamanic Experiences, and Secret Air Force Projects Created the UFO Myth|first=John Michael|last=Greer|date=October 31, 2020|publisher=Aeon Books|isbn=978-1-913504-44-1 |via=Google Books}} In a 1996 episode of The X-Files titled "Jose Chung's From Outer Space", a UFO contactee is revealed to be a fantasy-prone personality when he conveys a message from "Lord Kinbote", a creature who comes "not from outer space, but from inner space... from within the Earth's molten core".{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zbanRy_QZSAC&pg=PT352|title=The Philosophy of The X-Files|first=Dean A.|last=Kowalski|date=September 21, 2008|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=978-0-8131-3905-0 |via=Google Books}}

In music, Japanese visual artist Tadanori Yokoo depicted a UFO on the back cover of Miles Davis' 1975 album Agharta, flying in a spotlight over the subterranean kingdom of Agartha.{{harvnb|Buchwald|2012|p=110}}; {{harvnb|Thorgerson|Powell|1999|p=20}}. An inscription in the LP's gatefold sleeve explained that:

{{blockquote|During various periods in history the supermen of Agharta came to the surface of Earth to teach the human race how to live together in peace and save us from wars, catastrophe, and destruction. The apparent sighting of several flying saucers soon after the bombing of Hiroshima may represent one visitation.{{sfn|Buchwald|2012|p=110}}}}

Tadanori was partly inspired by Raymond W. Bernard's book The Hollow Earth.{{cite book|last1=Thorgerson|first1=Storm|author-link1=Storm Thorgerson|last2=Powell|first2=Aubrey|author-link2=Aubrey Powell (designer)|year=1999|title=100 Best Album Covers|publisher=DK Publishing|isbn=0-7894-4951-X|page=20}}

In their 1997 single Alien Attack the Swedish synthpop band S.P.O.C.K talk about a superior terrestrial race who fled to space long ago to escape a natural catastrophe and now is coming back disguised as aliens to claim their planet back.{{cite web |last1=Burg |first1=Press |title=Alien Attack |url=https://genius.com/Spock-rapper-alien-attack-lyrics |website=genius.com |access-date=Dec 22, 2023 |quote=60 million years ago Another race, superior to our Foresaw the catastrophy Fled to space and fled the tragedy Now they're here again with a simple claim Alien, alien attack They want their planet back}} The following year, American rapper Afrika Bambaataa and German DJ WestBam released the single Agharta - The City of Shamballa, under the compound artist name I.F.O. - Identified Flying Objects). The intro titles to the music video read "there are good forces that live inside the Earth sending out UFOs to free the world." Afrika Bambaataa, in the role of a black "UFO priest", sings the words "Don't you wanna go on my UFO?" and "I went to the North Pole I went to the South Pole I stepped in the Congo I stepped in a Hollow Hole they took me to another world the subterranean world it's called Agartha." Towards the end of the music video the point of origin of a fleet of flying saucers is revealed: a foggy gap within the mountains, and as the camera zooms out, planet Earth comes into full view and a big luminous hole in the ground can be seen at the pole of the Earth, out of an into which the UFOs fly.{{cite book |last1=Buchwald |first1=Dagmar |editor1-last=Berressem |editor2-last=Bucher |editor3-last=Schwagmeier |editor1-first=Hanjo |editor2-first=Michael |editor3-first=Uwe |title=Black Sun Underground: The Music of AlieNation - 1. UFOs from the Center of the Earth |date=2012 |publisher=LIT Verlag |isbn=9783643902283 |pages=101–102 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=miryZGheCbEC&q=ufo |access-date=Jan 9, 2024}}{{cite web |last1=Mellamphy |first1=Dan & Nandita Biswas |title=Welcome to the Electrocene, an Algorithmic Agartha |url=https://culturemachine.net/vol-16-drone-cultures/welcome-to-the-electrocene/ |website=culturemachine.net |date=16 December 2015 |access-date=Jan 9, 2024}}

In cinema, throughout Jordan Peele's 2022 movie Nope, protagonists OJ and Emerald discover that the UFO isn't a ship, but a flying cryptid or "space critter".{{cite web|url=https://www.themarysue.com/what-does-the-gordy-subplot-mean-in-jordan-peels-nope|title=What Does the Gordy Subplot Mean in Jordan Peel[e]'s {{'}}Nope{{'}}?|date=July 25, 2022|first=Princess|last=Weekes|website=The Mary Sue|quote=The murder of Jupe's family confirms to OJ that this flying saucer isn't a ship, but a predatory cryptid, one-winged-angel-style creature that acts when its dominance is tested when people look straight at it.|access-date=July 25, 2022|archive-date=July 25, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220725194022/https://www.themarysue.com/what-does-the-gordy-subplot-mean-in-jordan-peels-nope/|url-status=live}} Caltech professor John O. Dabiri worked with Peele and his team to design the UFO monster, specifically its final "biblical angel" form, to make it look like an undiscovered previously extinct aerial predator, with anatomical and locomotive elements inspired by jellyfish, octopuses, squid, electric eels and ghost knifefish, as well as the Earth-bound angels from Neon Genesis Evangelion.{{cite web|url=https://www.thrillist.com/entertainment/nation/nope-movie-ufo-design|title=Inside the Eerie UFO Design for Jordan Peele's 'Nope'|date=July 25, 2022|first=Emma|last=Stefansky|website=Thrillist|access-date=July 25, 2022|archive-date=July 25, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220725130532/https://www.thrillist.com/entertainment/nation/nope-movie-ufo-design|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=https://www.polygon.com/23277377/jordan-peele-nope-movie-creature-design-inspirations|title=The inspirations behind the monster in Nope|date=July 25, 2022|first=Toussaint|last=Egan|website=Polygon|page=]ublicly|access-date=July 25, 2022|quote=Over the course of the film, the UAP ["unidentified aerial phenomenon"] assumes several terrifying forms, which make it roughly something of a cross between a shark, a flying saucer, a manta ray, a flat humongous man-eating eyeball, and a "biblically accurate" angel, [with] Jean Jacket's appearance and design most closely resembl[ing] those of Sahaquiel, the 10th Angel, which appears in the 12th episode of the original 1995 anime, "A Miracle's Worth," and the second film in the Rebuild of Evangelion tetralogy, Evangelion[:] 2.0 You Can (Not) Advance|archive-date=July 25, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220725183333/https://www.polygon.com/23277377/jordan-peele-nope-movie-creature-design-inspirations|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=https://www.ign.com/articles/nope-review-jordan-peele|title=IGN: Nope Review|date=July 20, 2022|first=Siddhant|last=Adlakha|website=Polygon|access-date=July 20, 2022|quote=(the design of this apparent saucer is, initially, shocking in its simplicity, but by the end, you may as well call it "Biblically accurate").|archive-date=July 20, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220720161149/https://www.ign.com/articles/nope-review-jordan-peele|url-status=live}} In the MonsterVerse multimedia franchise, the term MUTO (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organism) is used to refer to creatures native to Earth (King Ghidorah being the only extraterrestrials in the series) that have eluded classification, hiding for centuries in the Hollow Earth, their underground homeworld. MUTOs have been dubbed “the UFOs of monsters” by Godzilla’s director Gareth Edwards.{{cite web|url=https://www.facebook.com/notes/godzilla/facebook-qa-with-director-gareth-edwards-may-4-2014/754626287901111|title=Facebook Q&A with Director Gareth Edwards|publisher=Facebook|access-date=Nov 26, 2023|url-status=live|archive-date=October 15, 2022|archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221015161041/https://www.facebook.com/notes/676481856610900/}}

Author and film-maker Owen Egerton claims that conspiracy theories involving the hollow Earth and advanced civilization can be dangerous in a post-truth era.{{cite news |author=David Barr Kirtley |title=The Hollow Earth Theory Isn't So Funny Anymore |url=https://www.wired.com/2020/12/geeks-guide-owen-egerton/ |access-date=Jan 17, 2024 |work=Geek's Guide to the Galaxy |issue=Episode 444 |publisher=Wired |date=Dec 11, 2020 |author1-link=David Barr Kirtley }}

• Brain in a vat
• Demon (thought experiment)
• Killing baby Hitler
• Ship of Theseus
• Extraterrestrial hypothesis
• Psychosocial hypothesis
• Interdimensional hypothesis
• Space animal hypothesis
• Hollow Earth hypothesis
• Ancient aliens hypothesis
• Silurian hypothesis
• Time-traveler UFO hypothesis

{{reflist}}

Category:21st-century neologisms

Category:Thought experiments

Category:Ufology