Edgar Mitchell is often remembered as an Apollo astronaut, the sixth person to walk on the Moon. Inside UAP studies, his more disruptive legacy is what he did after returning home: treating “contact” as a researchable human domain instead of a taboo punchline. This all stems from a powerful experience he claimed he had coming back from the Moon, which he described in a testimony to the Kennedy Space Center, and the work he did after his retirement from NASA: founding the Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS), helping Stanford Research Institute (SRI) with the Remote Viewing project, helping secure funding for Project Stargate, and many more like initiatives.
Before he ever co-founded FREE, Mitchell had already crossed a line that most astronauts would not. During Apollo 14 he conducted private ESP tests in flight, then later helped found the Institute of Noetic Sciences, explicitly aiming to study mind, consciousness, and anomalous experience with scientific tools.
FREE, the Dr. Edgar Mitchell Foundation for Research into Extraterrestrial and Extraordinary Encounters, became a continuation of that trajectory: a large-scale attempt to collect data from people reporting contact with non-human intelligence (NHI), with or without UAP, and then quantify patterns that small case-series could never reliably surface. The choice of the words Extraterrestrial and Extraordinary was a deliberate pairing that captured both sides of his epistemic gamble. “Extraterrestrial” anchored the public-facing pillar: encounters conventionally framed as alien or UAP-related. “Extraordinary” widened the aperture, inviting inclusion of near-death experiences, out-of-body states, and other consciousness-related phenomena that fall outside laboratory norms but within human reportability. That dual mandate: empirical data on the “extraordinary” without presupposing extraterrestrial origin, was more than branding; it was the methodological hinge of the project.
This is a data-first explainer of what FREE actually did, who it was for, what it found (and what it did not), how it was received, and what its results imply for UAP research going forward.
FREE in 12 numbers
These are not “proof of NHI.” They are the measurable outputs of a very large self-report dataset collected under defined rules.
- Sample size analyzed in the peer-reviewed paper: N = 3,256 contact experiencers.
- Survey scope: two quantitative phases totaling 554 questions.
- Phase sizes: Phase 1 N = 3,256; Phase 2 N = 1,919 (Phase 2 completed Phase 1 first).
- Positive vs negative impact: ~70% (N = 2,279) reported life changed in a “positive way”; 15–20% reported negative impact.
- “Craft/ship associated with the contact experience”: 64% (N = 993 of 1,556) answered yes.
- Most common reported UAP shape (among those reporting shapes): circular 70%; then triangle 36%, oval 34%, cylindrical/cigar 28%, cloud-like 22%.
- Country distribution in the Phase 1 dataset: United States 64.1%, Canada 8.4%, Australia 8.3%, UK 7.2% (88%+ combined).
- Reported high-strangeness “home” effects (ranges across the four biggest country samples): telepathic messages 52–58%, appliance malfunctions 45–55%, “missing time” 40–48%, strange lights in home 36–48%.
- “Sighting a UAP is not necessarily associated with a contact experience” and UAP-linked contact was not the predominant form in their dataset.
- In a Phase 2 subgroup meeting criteria for “matrix reality” contact, ~80% reported consciousness separated from the body; 72% reported “expanded consciousness” during contact.
- Only about one-quarter or fewer reported conscious recall of being onboard a UAP craft and physically interacting with NHI (in the analysis described).
- Communication was common: >83% (N = 1,184) of those answering the question reported receiving some form of communication from NHI, and 67% reported “reassuring messages.”
If you only remember one thing, remember this: FREE’s flagship result was not “lots of abductions.” It was a patterned landscape where non-physical or altered-state contact modalities appear at least as prominent, often more prominent, than classic “nuts-and-bolts” onboard narratives.
What FREE was trying to do (and why Mitchell mattered)
FREE’s public framing was straightforward: build foundational data on contact experiences at a scale large enough to detect recurring structure, then compare “UAP contact” with other anomalous modalities (NDE, OBE, remote viewing, meditation, etc.) as part of a broader consciousness research program.
This matters because Mitchell’s post-Apollo orientation was never limited to “lights in the sky.” He was explicitly interested in non-locality, mind-to-mind transfer, and what he called non-local communication. In FREE’s own language, that became a working assumption: that multiple contact modalities may be interrelated through consciousness.
You do not have to accept the metaphysics to acknowledge the methodological pivot. Instead of starting with radar tracks and hoping they lead to meaning, FREE started with the experiencer population and asked: what actually clusters together, across thousands of narratives, when you force people to answer the same structured questions?
Audience: who FREE was built for
FREE’s work lands differently depending on what you are trying to do.
- Researchers and method-builders
The stated goal was baseline data that later teams could validate, falsify, and improve. The peer-reviewed paper even argues that future work needs validated psychological instruments to identify “true contact experiencers” and separate contact types cleanly. - Experiencers seeking context and reducing stigma
FREE explicitly paired research with education and support, describing peer-to-peer support services for experiencers in its public materials. - Clinicians and counselors
A quiet but important implication is triage: if many experiencers interpret contact as transformative and often positive, simplistic “pathology-only” models can fail them. At the same time, a meaningful minority reports harm, fear, or disruption, which requires competent care pathways. - UAP investigators who suspect “contact” is central
The dataset challenges the older habit of treating “entities” as an embarrassing side-topic. The contact component is not a footnote here; it is the primary object of measurement.
Methodology: how the FREE study was built
Study design and phases
FREE’s quantitative program was built as phased, escalating depth:
- Phase 1: N = 3,256 in the published analysis (described as completable in 45–60 minutes in one methodological report).
- Phase 2: N = 1,919, only accessible after completing Phase 1, and described as taking 3–4 hours.
- Phase 3 (qualitative): described as 70 open-ended questions plus additional quantitative questions, administered to those completing both phases, with total questions across surveys described as 705 in one report.
Tools: the surveys were administered online using SurveyMonkey.
What counted as “data” (a key constraint)
Participants were instructed to answer based on conscious explicit memory, not hypnosis, and not based on channeling or other memory-retrieval approaches.
This matters. It means FREE intentionally tried to avoid one of the most common critiques in abduction-era research: that hypnotic regression can introduce suggestion and confabulation. Whether you think hypnosis sometimes retrieves hidden truth or not, FREE’s dataset is anchored in conscious recall as a standard.
Recruitment and publicity
FREE’s methodology document describes aggressive outreach beyond traditional UAP groups: thousands of emails to prior registrants, weekly posts across hundreds of Facebook groups spanning UAP, parapsychology, spirituality, and related communities, plus extensive radio interviews to recruit globally.
This wide-net strategy is a double-edged blade:
- It increases reach and diversity beyond one organization’s membership.
- It also guarantees self-selection effects (people opt in because they identify with the topic).
A data-first read treats this as neither fatal nor trivial. It defines what the results can claim: patterns within a self-selected experiencer population, not prevalence rates in the general population.
Anonymity and ethics
FREE reports that responses were anonymous except for participant email addresses, and that no personally identifying information like names or addresses was collected in the survey record described.
Bias handling: “speeders” and response integrity
The peer-reviewed paper explicitly discusses response-quality concerns common to long online surveys. It tracks completion time and describes grouping respondents by how long they spent, noting that very fast completers (“speeders”) skipped more items and endorsed far fewer response opportunities.
This is a meaningful methodological detail: even in anomalous research, survey hygiene matters. Time-on-task is not a perfect filter, but it is a real attempt to quantify response integrity in an otherwise messy domain.
Findings: the signal inside the noise
FREE’s dataset is too large to summarize honestly as “people saw greys.” The more accurate framing is: the study describes a multi-modal contact ecology, with UAP sightings as one component, and altered states, communication, and aftereffects as major measurable dimensions.
UAP sightings look surprisingly consistent across countries
Across the four largest country samples (US, Canada, Australia, UK), roughly two-thirds reported seeing an “intelligently controlled craft,” and substantial proportions reported hovering, “impossible maneuvers,” and rapid disappearance, with multiple-observer sightings in more than a third of cases.
This is important even if you are primarily a “contact” researcher. It says: within this experiencer-defined sample, the UAP component is not random. The reported performance characteristics cluster in ways familiar to classic UAP case literature, and do so across multiple national contexts.
“Craft associated with contact” is common, but not universal
In one subset analysis: 64% (N = 993 of 1,556) answered yes to a craft/ship being associated with their contact experience.
The implication is subtle: UAP-linked contact is important, but a large minority reports contact without a craft anchor, which moves the research question away from “Where did the vehicle come from?” and toward “What is the mechanism of the experience itself?”
The “non-physical” and “matrix reality” layer is central
FREE’s flagship peer-reviewed framing states that many reported contact experiences are largely non-physical, occurring via telepathy, out-of-body experience, or a “matrix-like” reality, and that UAP-associated contact was not the predominant form of contact in their dataset.
In a Phase 2 subgroup meeting specific criteria related to “matrix reality,” the authors report high rates of altered-state features: around 80% reporting consciousness separated from the body, 72% reporting expanded consciousness, and high frequencies of time distortion and intensified perception.
They also report a striking inversion relative to pop culture expectations: experiences described as alternate realities, OBEs, and related phenomena were more frequent than claims of being physically brought onto a craft, with only about one-quarter or fewer reporting conscious recall of onboard interaction in that context.
You do not need to accept every interpretive leap to see the empirical point: when experiencers are asked the same structured questions, the “location” of contact is often not described as a physical room inside a physical vehicle.
Communication is common, and often framed as reassuring
The paper emphasizes communication as an “often-ignored aspect” of contact experiences. It reports that >83% (N = 1,184) of those responding to a specific question said they received some type of communication from NHI, and that 67% reported receiving “reassuring messages.”
This is not a minor detail. In many classic abduction-era narratives, communication is present but not always treated as the primary variable. FREE turns it into a measurable dimension that can be correlated with outcomes.
Aftereffects: mostly positive transformation, with a real minority reporting harm
In the abstract of the peer-reviewed paper, ~70% reported positive life change, while 15–20% reported negative impact.
Elsewhere, the analysis suggests that people’s framing of their experiences can shift over time. Among those reporting conscious recall of onboard craft experiences, the paper describes an increase in “positive, egalitarian” framing from first encounters to later encounters, interpreted as adaptation or integration.
The study also reports that the “type of being” correlates with reported emotional valence: “human looking” and “hybrid” categories were associated with more positive responses, while “reptilian” was associated with more negative responses in the reported data.
A rigorous interpretation here is not “these beings are objectively good or bad.” It is: experiencers report patterned emotional outcomes that track with the perceived character of the encounter.
The “high-strangeness household” cluster shows up repeatedly
Across country subsamples, the study reports relatively consistent rates of telepathic messages, missing time, electrical malfunctions, and lights in the home.
From a data-first perspective, this is one of FREE’s most operationally useful results. It identifies candidate variables that could be instrumented in future work (power quality monitoring, environmental sensors, sleep tracking, etc.), rather than remaining purely narrative.
What FREE does not prove (and what it does)
A disciplined explainer has to draw a boundary.
FREE proves:
- A large, structured dataset exists from thousands of experiencers, collected under explicit constraints (conscious recall, long-form survey, phased design).
- In that dataset, measurable patterns exist across countries, contact modalities, reported communications, and aftereffects.
- The experiencer population, as sampled, reports far more variety than the classic “abduction only” frame, including strong altered-state components.
FREE does not prove:
- That NHI is objectively present as a physical actor in each case.
- That any specific consciousness model (quantum hologram, simulation model, etc.) is correct.
- That these rates generalize to the public at large (self-selection makes that inference invalid without external sampling).
The honest conclusion is more interesting than either extreme. FREE provides a map of reported experience-space, showing where the “terrain” has ridges (clusters) and where it has valleys (rarer claims). It is a scaffolding for the next generation of instrumented, comparative research.
Reception: how the world met the data
Academic and scholarly reception
FREE’s central quantitative results were published as a peer-reviewed article in the Journal of Scientific Exploration in 2018.
The paper is indexed in philosophy-of-science and interdisciplinary listings such as PhilPapers, which at the time of the listing shows it as “cited by 18.”
This placement matters because it signals a particular kind of legitimacy: not mainstream consensus, but entry into the ecosystem of formal publication where methods can be scrutinized and debated.
Skeptical reception
A review in Skeptical Inquirer (January/February 2019) frames the contact accounts as experiences that may be sincerely reported, but questions the “UAP narrative” layer and emphasizes that the authors themselves concede the experiences are not provable “with any known methods.”
That critique is useful even for pro-contact researchers, because it targets the core vulnerability of experiencer datasets: without independent instrumentation, the evidentiary weight rests primarily on consistency, testimony, and patterns.
Community and alternative-media reception
FREE’s own media strategy leaned into podcasts, radio, and digital press. Its 2018 press release positioned its book (titled Beyond UFOs) as a detailed analysis of survey data from “over 4,200” individuals, and explicitly invited media outlets to request review copies.
That posture, “we have data, cover it,” helped push experiencer research into wider UAP discourse, even if many mainstream science outlets stayed away.
Implications
UAP research expands from objects to interfaces
If large portions of contact are reported as non-physical, the object-only paradigm becomes incomplete. Instrumentation still matters, but so does the human interface layer: perception, altered state markers, sleep physiology, trauma signatures, and long-term value shifts.
FREE’s own conclusion points toward building validated instruments and focusing on “frequent interactors” as a more homogeneous subgroup for deeper study.
Contact research becomes a public health and social systems question
A dataset where most respondents report positive transformation but a significant minority reports harm implies two simultaneous needs:
- integration frameworks (support, meaning-making, community)
- clinical competence (differential diagnosis, trauma care, sleep disruption evaluation)
Whatever “contact” ultimately is, the experiencer population is real as a social fact. The stigma costs are measurable in isolation and mis-treatment.
Policy and governance implications: “planetary adulthood” requires protocols
FREE does not create foreign policy. But it does argue that contact experiences are widespread enough to require seriousness.
If you treat experiencer testimony as you would in a courtroom, not as automatic proof but as admissible human evidence, then the policy implication is not immediate confirmation of NHI. It is the need for:
- standardized reporting pathways
- research funding that is insulated from ridicule
- ethical guidelines for interaction narratives
- international scientific cooperation, because the dataset itself is cross-national
Claims taxonomy
Verified
- FREE conducted multi-phase online surveys of contact experiencers and analyzed a Phase 1 dataset of N = 3,256 in a peer-reviewed publication.
- Respondents reported high rates of positive life impact (~70%) and lower rates of negative impact (15–20%) in that analysis.
- The dataset includes measurable distributions of country-of-origin, reported UAP shapes, and reported “high-strangeness” effects.
Probable
- Within a self-selected experiencer population, contact is frequently reported as non-physical or altered-state mediated, and not always tied to a visible UAP.
- Communication content and affective outcomes show patterned structure that can guide future instrumented research.
Disputed
- That reported contact experiences demonstrate objective NHI presence in physical reality in the majority of cases.
- That any specific explanatory framework (quantum hologram consciousness, simulation model) correctly explains causality.
Legend
- Not applicable in the narrow sense here, since this is modern survey research rather than a traditional cultural narrative.
Misidentification
- Some experiences may be misattributed at the individual level (sleep-related states, memory errors), but FREE’s dataset does not adjudicate case-by-case ground truth.
Hoax
- The study does not claim to detect hoaxes; it measures reported experience patterns. Skeptical reception often points to the lack of external validation as a limiting factor.
Speculation labels
This section separates interpretation from data, the way a careful newsroom separates “what happened” from “what it might mean.”
Hypothesis
- Contact modalities as one underlying phenomenon: FREE’s framing proposes that UAP contact, NDE, OBE, remote viewing, and other modalities may be interrelated through non-local consciousness.
- “Matrix-like reality” as a repeated phenomenological structure: the high rates of time distortion and disembodiment could indicate a distinct contact state rather than a location.
Witness interpretation
- “NHI communication” is frequently reported as telepathic or non-verbal, and experiencers interpret it as intentional messaging.
- “Craft” sightings are interpreted as intelligently controlled and not man-made by respondents, sometimes with multiple witnesses.
Researcher opinion
- FREE authors argue that contact associated with UAP is not predominant and that focusing only on traces and sightings has not advanced understanding of what “governs and regulates” the phenomenon.
- The study authors propose future work should prioritize frequent interactors, develop validated instruments, and design multidisciplinary follow-ups.
References
Backström, F., & Mitchell, E. (2001/2002). Private lunar ESP: An interview with Edgar Mitchell. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 5. https://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/5/backstrom_mitchell.php?utm_source=uapedia.ai
Galarneau, L. (2018, June 13). Overview and mission of FREE. Medium. https://medium.com/the-foundation-for-research-into-extraterrestrial/overview-and-mission-of-free-5f778048c760?utm_source=uapedia.ai
Galarneau, L. (2018, July 23). The Dr. Edgar Mitchell FREE Foundation has published their groundbreaking study on consciousness and contact. Medium. https://medium.com/the-foundation-for-research-into-extraterrestrial/the-dr-edgar-mitchell-free-foundation-has-published-their-groundbreaking-study-on-consciousness-de99535f46e5?utm_source=uapedia.ai
Goertzel, T. (2019). What are contact “experiencers” really experiencing? (Review of Beyond UFOs: The Science of Consciousness and Contact with Non-Human Intelligence, Volume I). Skeptical Inquirer, 43(1). https://skepticalinquirer.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/29/2019/03/SI-JF-19.pdf?utm_source=uapedia.ai
Hernandez, R., Davis, R., Scalpone, R., & Schild, R. (2018). A study on reported contact with non-human intelligence associated with unidentified aerial phenomena. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 32(2), 294–344. https://bobdavisspeaks.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/jse322hernandezetal.pdf?utm_source=uapedia.ai
Hernandez, R., Klimo, J., & Schild, R. (2018). A report on Phase I and II of the Dr. Edgar Mitchell FREE Experiencer Research Study (methodology summary chapter circulated as PDF). https://agreaterreality.com/downloads/articles/Hernandez%2C%20Klimo%2C%20Shild%20-%20UFO%20Report.pdf?utm_source=uapedia.ai
Hernandez, R. (2018). A study on reported contact with non-human intelligence associated with unidentified aerial phenomena (PhilPapers listing). https://philpapers.org/rec/HERASO-8?utm_source=uapedia.ai
Suggested internal crosslinks for UAPedia
- Edgar Mitchell: A Biography for the Modern UAP Era
- Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS)
- Telepathic communication in UAP encounters
- Out-of-body experiences and UAP contact
- Near-death experiences and anomalous contact
- John E. Mack and clinical approaches to experiencers
- Journal of Scientific Exploration and anomalistics publishing
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