Hysteria 51

This week on Hysteria 51, we’re diving into the ocean’s two favorite hobbies: inventing bizarre new nightmares and hiding gigantic things in plain sight. First up: researchers are tracking a marine virus that appears to have jumped from aquatic animals to humans in China, with cases linked to things like handling seafood and potentially eating it raw. The weirdest part? The reported symptoms hit the eyes, causing a condition tied to high eye pressure and, in some cases, serious vision damage. It’s the kind of headline that makes you look at a shrimp cocktail and whisper, “We cool… or are we enemies?” Then we go full “planet is still mysterious” with an oceanography flex: a massive seamount along the Nazca Ridge has been mapped that rises 3,109 meters from the seafloor, taller than Greece’s Mount Olympus. And because the deep sea can’t just be normal, explorers also documented wild-looking lifeforms, including the so-called “flying spaghetti monsters” that sound like a joke until you remember the ocean has zero chill. So buckle in for a weird-news joyride through ocean discoveries, deep-sea monsters, emerging virus headlines, and the unsettling realization that Earth is basically a cosmic aquarium with secrets and jump scares. Links & Resources 📌Fishy Sickness 📌Wet Olympus Email us your favorite WEIRD news stories: [email protected] Support the Show Get exclusive content & perks as well as an ad and sponsor free experience at https://www.patreon.com/Hysteria51 from just $1 Shop Be the Best Dressed at your Cult Meeting! https://www.teepublic.com/stores/hysteria51?ref_id=9022 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Is reality real… or are we all just characters in the universe’s weirdest video game? Join us as we explore the mind-bending ideas of sci-fi legend Philip K. Dick, who believed a mysterious pink beam of information blasted knowledge into his brain in 1974 and revealed a shocking truth: reality might be a simulation. Dick even suspected his classic novel The Man in the High Castle could contain memories from previous versions of the universe. Was he a visionary who glimpsed the code behind reality, or a brilliant writer following one very strange rabbit hole? We dive into Dick’s theories about VALIS, the idea that the Roman Empire never ended, déjà vu as timeline glitches, and how modern thinkers like Nick Bostrom are seriously debating whether we might actually be living in a simulation. So, reboot your brain as we ask the ultimate question: Is reality real… or just convincing software? Find out this week on Hysteria 51! Special thanks to this week’s research sources: Philip K. Dick’s Mystical Experiences (2-3-74) https://pkdick.com/literary-criticism/exegesis/ The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick (overview and background) https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780547549255 The Man in the High Castle – Background and Themes https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Man-in-the-High-Castle Philip K. Dick on Reality and Illusion (Famous Quote & Philosophy) https://www.themarginalian.org/2015/03/02/philip-k-dick-reality/ Nick Bostrom – Are We Living in a Computer Simulation? https://www.simulation-argument.com MIT Physicist Seth Lloyd – The Universe as a Quantum Computer https://web.mit.edu/~sethlloyd/ John Archibald Wheeler – “It from Bit” and Informational Physics https://www.edge.org/conversation/john_archibald_wheeler-it-from-bit The Holographic Principle Explained https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-holographic-principle-20130904/ Gerard ’t Hooft – Holographic Universe Research https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1999/thooft/facts/ Leonard Susskind – Black Hole Information and Holography https://theoreticalminimum.com Integrated Information Theory (Giulio Tononi) https://iep.utm.edu/int-info/ The Hard Problem of Consciousness – David Chalmers https://consc.net/papers/facing.html Wave Function Collapse – Quantum Mechanics Basics https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-collapse/ Simulation Hypothesis and Physics Discussion (Scientific American) https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/are-we-living-in-a-computer-simulation/ Email us your favorite WEIRD news stories: [email protected] Help Support the Show: Get exclusive content & perks as well as an ad and sponsor free experience at https://www.patreon.com/Hysteria51 from just $1 Shop: Be the Best Dressed at your Cult Meeting! https://www.teepublic.com/stores/hysteria51?ref_id=9022 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Kevin Crispin from the Behind Beautiful Things Podcast fills in for Brent this week, and the universe rewards him with two gloriously broken news stories. First up, a bizarre and unsettling case involving prescription meds and behavior so reckless it sounds made up. Then it’s off to the Bahamas, where sharks have apparently been sampling the full human experience: cocaine, caffeine, and painkillers. Modern life is poison, the ocean is on drugs, and somehow this is still a comedy podcast! Links & Resources 📌Medical Gamble 📌Shark Party Follow Kevin and Behind Beautiful Things https://www.sadtimespodcast.com/ Email us your favorite WEIRD news stories: [email protected] Support the Show Get exclusive content & perks as well as an ad and sponsor free experience at https://www.patreon.com/Hysteria51 from just $1 Shop Be the Best Dressed at your Cult Meeting! https://www.teepublic.com/stores/hysteria51?ref_id=9022 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Brent’s out this week, so we’ve summoned Kevin Crispin (Behind Beautiful Things Podcast) to the mic like a substitute teacher who immediately rolls in a TV cart labeled “EXTREMELY CURSED VHS.” And thanks to listener scouts James Polk and Lex Lake, we’ve got two fresh servings of “what in the absolute haunted ham sandwich” weird news. First stop: the University of Oklahoma, where a construction project hits an unexpected speed bump… made of human remains. 😬 Officials say the bones appear to be century-old cadavers likely used for educational purposes back in the early 1900s, which is both historically fascinating and also a sentence that makes your skin try to uninstall itself. We dig into the eerie archaeology, the academic backstory, and the unsettling vibes of finding yesterday’s lesson plan under today’s foundation. Then we hop across the pond to Britain’s paranormal buffet line, Cannock Chase, where Bigfoot stories apparently weren’t enough, so the universe hit “add DLC” and dropped a terrifying seven-foot ‘Pigman’ into the woods. Picture a man-shaped problem with a pig head and the confidence of something that knows you can’t run without wheezing. We break down the alleged sightings, the “evidence,” the expert takes, and the important scientific question: if it’s seven feet tall, does it snort in iambic pentameter? It’s true crime-adjacent history, cryptid chaos, and listener-powered nonsense the way nature (and your algorithm) intended. Strap in, Hysteria Nation: this episode has bones, boars, and bad decisions.  Links & Resources 📌Deadly Detention 📌British Oinker Follow Kevin and Behind Beautiful Things https://www.sadtimespodcast.com/ Email us your favorite WEIRD news stories: [email protected] Support the Show Get exclusive content & perks as well as an ad and sponsor free experience at https://www.patreon.com/Hysteria51 from just $1 Shop Be the Best Dressed at your Cult Meeting! https://www.teepublic.com/stores/hysteria51?ref_id=9022 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

What if the biggest secret in UFO history isn’t alien… it’s angelic? Or demonic. Or somewhere in that awkward in-between where rockets and ritual candles share shelf space. This week, we plunge headfirst into one of the strangest rabbit holes in modern conspiracy lore: the alleged “Collins Elite” — a rumored faction inside the U.S. government that supposedly concluded UFOs aren’t extraterrestrials at all, but deceptive spiritual entities. We unpack where the story comes from, what believers claim insiders discovered, and why some say disclosure could be less about little green men and more about theological shockwaves. But that’s just the warm-up. Did Allied intelligence really brush shoulders with a British occultist during WWII? Was Aleister Crowley pitching magical countermeasures against Nazi symbolism? And how does rocket pioneer Jack Parsons’ sex-magic rituals tie into the birth of the modern UFO era? We explore the full fringe narrative — demons disguised as aliens, ritual “doorways,” Cold War psychic programs, and secret spiritual warfare in the Pentagon — while also laying out the documented history, the skepticism, and the very human tendency to mythologize the unknown. Is this a hidden chapter of national security history… or a masterclass in how conspiracies evolve when secrecy meets symbolism? Strap in. It’s rockets, rituals, remote viewing, and Revelation — this week on Hysteria 51. Special thanks to this week’s research sources: Congressional & Government Records U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Accountability. “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth.” Hearing, November 13, 2024. https://oversight.house.gov/hearing/unidentified-anomalous-phenomena-exposing-the-truth/ U.S. Congress. “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth.” 118th Congress Hearing Record. https://www.congress.gov/118/chrg/CHRG-118hhrg57440/CHRG-118hhrg57440.pdf Shellenberger, Michael. Written Testimony. U.S. House Oversight Committee, November 13, 2024. https://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Written-Testimony-Shellenberger.pdf Central Intelligence Agency. “STARGATE Collection.” CIA FOIA Electronic Reading Room. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/collection/stargate Central Intelligence Agency. “An Evaluation of the Remote Viewing Program.” https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP96-00791R000200180005-5.pdf Central Intelligence Agency. “Project MKULTRA.” CIA FOIA Reading Room. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/06760269 U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. “Project MKULTRA, the CIA’s Program of Research in Behavioral Modification.” Hearing, August 3, 1977. https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/sites-default-files-hearings-95mkultra.pdf U.S. Department of Defense. FOIA Reading Room Release referencing MKOFTEN and related research. https://www.esd.whs.mil/Portals/54/Documents/FOID/Reading%20Room/NCB/02-A-0846_RELEASE.pdf Collins Elite & Demonic UFO Claims Redfern, Nick. Final Events: Demonic UFOs, Alien Abductions, the Government, and the Afterlife. Anomalist Books, 2010. “Final Events.” Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Events Milburn, F. “The Pentagon’s UAP Task Force.” BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 1,836, 2020. https://besacenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/183-Milburn-study-final.pdf Occult & WWII Context Crowley, Aleister. Biographical overview. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleister_Crowley “V sign.” Wikipedia (Crowley and WWII ‘V for Victory’ claims). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_sign Parsons, Jack. Biographical overview. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Parsons “Sex-Cult Rocket Man.” JSTOR Daily. https://daily.jstor.org/sex-cult-rocket-man/ Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. The Occult Roots of Nazism. NYU Press. https://nyupress.org/9780814730607/occult-roots-of-nazism/ Media Coverage Medill on the Hill. “UAP Hearing Coverage.” November 2024. https://medillonthehill.medill.northwestern.edu/2024/11/uap/ Email us your favorite WEIRD news stories: [email protected] Help Support the Show: Get exclusive content & perks as well as an ad and sponsor free experience at https://www.patreon.com/Hysteria51 from just $1 Shop: Be the Best Dressed at your Cult Meeting! https://www.teepublic.com/stores/hysteria51?ref_id=9022 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.