Profound Events In Modern Science

Science has had many a profound impact on our lives since the turn of the 20^th Century and not always a positive one – depending on who you talk to. There have been literally hundreds of significant scientific concepts, events, including inventions that have had a profound impact on our individual selves and our society. Any list doesn’t bring justice, and there will be howls of protest for omissions, but still, here’s a baker’s dozen that I feel are pretty profound.

Here are some reasonably profound events in science from 1900 to date that I feel are important in the broader historical, social and cultural context.

1) Sputnik (1957): Unless you lived through it, it’s hard to imagine the impact that the launch of the Soviet artificial satellite Sputnik had all of a sudden on the public awareness of outer space as an actual place where things could happen. The shock-horror to the American psyche was profound, resulting in a massive boost to American science and technological education, acerbating the Cold War, and of course resulting in the Space Race which culminated with the first landing on the Moon (1969). Without Sputnik, there still might not have been any human involvement in space and space exploration in general, and where would we be without artificial satellites in orbit today.

2) Humans in Orbit (1961 to date): It may be ho-hum now, but back in the era of Project Mercury people were glued to their TV screens for the coverage of ‘man into space’. Ditto of course the first voyage to the Moon (Apollo 8) and the first landing on the Moon (Apollo 11). When the two Space Shuttle disasters happened, both re-awakened interest in no uncertain terms. Equally, the Russians were rapped in the many early successes of their space program while America suffered early humiliation after humiliation. But in an era of the Vietnam conflict, civil rights riots in the streets, the Cold War, and of course terrorism, manned space flight gave people something positive to cheer about. Further, there have been massive technological spin-offs as well that have filtered down to the general public. 

3) Modern Communications (1900 to date): It’s hard to believe that not all that long ago, a mere six or seven generations back, it took months to correspond between say Europe and America, or across America, or from America to Australia. However did those poor tweens, teens and young adults cope without instant communication feedback via their Facebook, Twitter or emails way back in those dark ages (how sad: sob; sob; sob). But then along comes wired technologies like the telegraph and telephone cabling and wireless technologies like ham radio and telecommunication satellites, the airplane sped things up too and then finally comes along the Internet and everything that’s i-this-gadget or i-that-doohickie, or i-the-next-damned-gizmo that’s under the proverbial sun (that you have to upgrade every six months). Whether ultimately this entire instant “I just gotta be in touch with everybody everywhere 24/7” will prove its worth or not remains to be seen. Back six or seven generations ago, if you had something to say and it took months to reach the person intended, it probably was important. Can one conclude the same today?  Recall how the automobile revolutionized everything and not necessarily for the better.  

4) Quantum Physics (1920’s): Though the first inklings of what would become quantum mechanics surfaced at the very turn of the century, the subject bloomed into a scientific revolution in the 1920’s. It wasn’t very long before applications were found, and today quantum physics is ultimately responsible for contributions to over one-third of the global economy in various gizmos and gadgets and their applications, many of which are in the possession of you readers.

5) First Nuclear Chain Reaction (1942) & Trinity A-Bomb Test (1945): Collectively these two experimental events gave rise to all of the nuclear issues part and parcel of our world today. That first chain reaction demonstrated that nuclear fission was more than just a theoretical idea and that controlled fission would lead to a nearly unlimited energy supply; uncontrolled fission, as demonstrated at Trinity, goes ka-boom, as in the A-Bomb. When controlled, radioactivity has many applications today, nuclear power (which doesn’t give off greenhouse gas emissions but has other issues) being of course one; nuclear medicine another; and radioactive traces are employed in all sorts of environmental work. Nuclear weapons, nuclear arms control, nuclear terrorism, radioactive waste, and related issues are of course on the opposite side of the nuclear coin.

6) Radar (1940’s): RAdio Detection And Ranging (RADAR) was developed in secret just before and during World War Two. Quite apart from all those obvious military applications, radar is central to modern airline operations and safe flying; the same applies to maritime safety; it’s a common tool for police in keeping those with a tendency to put the pedal to the metal under control; its use is obvious in weather forecasting and warning systems; radar helps keep track of all those bits and pieces we’ve put into orbit, and it has applications in geology (ground penetrating radar) to map subsurface terrain, even in astronomy bouncing radio and microwaves off the surface of nearly moons and planets be it from the ground or from space probes. Unless you’ve been caught speeding, you’re probably quite appreciative of all that radar does for you.   

7) First SETI Experiment (Project Ozma – 1960): Let’s for once try to answer that age old question “are we alone in the cosmos”. Make it so, and so it came to pass where experimental time and money was put where only just before the theoretical mouth was. As we are all too aware, that first experiment, conducted by Dr. Frank Drake, failed to detect ET. In fact every SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence) experimental effort to date has failed, but there has to be a first time for everything, and Project Ozma was the first SETI effort, and the significance lies in the fact that for the first time ever, and it’s our generation that’s making it so, exobiology (or astrobiology) has become an experimental instead of just a theoretical science, albeit on still in search of its subject. 

8) Flying Saucers (1947 to date): More books, articles, websites, and documentaries have been done about the subject of UFOs than any other aspect of science. Yes science, since there is a case to be answered even if it is a social one, but even the possible connection with extraterrestrial life makes the study a profound and of course interesting one. Alas, if 65 is considered normal retirement then UFOs should already be pensioned off. Despite that, they do keep on keeping on despite all the best debunking efforts by those self-appointed to act as ‘professional’ sceptics.

9) Chariots of the Gods (1950’s to date): It has been pointed out that it would be extraordinary in terms of probability that ET via those pesky UFOs would pick the last generation or two to show up. This is true. However, negating that little objection, there’s the concept of the ‘ancient astronaut’ – ET has been around for over 100 generations (minimum) with suggestive evidence (not proof) cobbled together from anthropology, archaeology, literature, religions and mythology. While author Erich Von Daniken has been the most visible of the ‘ancient astronaut’ proponents, he wasn’t the first to advocate the idea that ET played a role in the development of mankind. The central issue of profoundness is that any study that suggests that intelligent extraterrestrial life exists, and even more to the point, has had a cultural impact on human society, can’t be easily shrugged off.   

10) King Tutankhamen’s Tomb (1922): Ever since Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt, Egyptology has been big business for publishers, private collectors, museums, Egyptian tourism, etc. However, Egyptology really took off in the mainstream consciousness following the discovery of the Pharaoh known as Tutankhamen, or the Boy King’s tomb, by archaeologist and Egyptologist Howard Carter. The impact on archaeology in general and Egyptology in particular has been and remains profound. There’s hardly anyone who hasn’t heard about Pharaoh Tutankhamen, and worldwide exhibition tours of artefacts found in his tomb attract huge crowds. 

11) Discovery of Penicillin (1928): We all know about that wonder drug penicillin, discovered rather accidentally by Alexander Fleming, which has been responsible for saving more lives than you can shake a stick at. That gave rise to a whole potpourri of antibiotics, but it also gave rise to the Pandora’s Box of antibiotic resistance and the rise of the super-bug, an issue that is both current, ongoing, and of concern to anyone and everyone ever likely be suffer from an infection. 

12) The First Heart Transplant (1967): Anyone who was around at the time can remember the massive amount of press coverage that very first human heart transplant that took place, in Cape Town, South Africa, under the direction of Christiaan Barnard. Back then, this was Big News. Thousands of human heart transplants are now preformed annually and of course it is no longer Big News – unless you are one of those on the receiving end.   

13) Genetic Code (the Discovery of DNA in 1953) & Associated Human Genome Project (2000 to date): Hands up anyone who hasn’t heard about Watson and Crick and the discovery of the substance and structure of DNA in 1953. No hands up? Well that’s not surprising as it is one of the most famous of the famous of scientific achievements in relatively modern times. Ultimately that discovery (along with massive amounts of additional genetically relevant biochemistry since then) has morphed into the Human Genome Project, the importance of which has yet to reach full potential. But full understanding of our genetic makeup is an important tool in coming to terms with all those hundreds of genetic afflictions we can suffer from, and curing (or preventing) same. 

And there’s a dozen dozens more, like the Discovery of X-Rays (1895) so that date is eliminated from ‘modern’ science, though where would modern medicine and dentistry be without X-Rays as well as applications in materials testing, etc. Most of the applications took place in the 20^th Century. Anyway, as I said, there are many more examples that could, probably should be included, but space is limited.

Honourable Mention: Where’s Einstein’s Special and General Relativity? Well, Einstein’s Relativity only rates an honourable mention since it has relatively little impact or application, apart from GPS, in modern society. When (and if) we start to boldly go, then horses will change their colour.

UFOs & the Anti-ETH: Summation Arguments: Part Two

That the scientific communities and scientists in general (there are exceptions) dismiss the UFO ETH (extraterrestrial hypothesis) as pseudoscience and total bunk is understandable, but illogical. The scientists’ anti UFO ETH arguments don’t stand up to logical scrutiny. Here’s some more of their specific objections, and why they are in turn, objectionable. To adequately come to terms with the UFO ETH one needs to have a ‘deep time’ perspective; not just one of here and now or last week, month, year, decade or even centuries ago.

Continued from yesterday’s blog…

It doesn’t take much imagination – and many have imagined it – that ET has been in Earth’s hair on a nearly ongoing basis. The key point is once that initial chance discovery has happened, and that could have been billions of years ago, we’re charted, noted and logged biological real estate. We’re now a colored pin on the galactic map, say green for simple biosphere; yellow for complex life, orange for intelligence and red for here be a civilization. Within 100,000 years of that first contact (even if it were ET greeting our microbial ancestors), light speed radio communications would have notified all potentially receptive (and future receptive) alien civilizations that here was one of those rare abodes, a planet with a biosphere, and thus one worth ongoing routine (not random) investigations – for scientific reasons if nothing else.

The terrestrial parallels are obvious. Once we discovered Antarctica it quickly became common knowledge. We went back, again, and again and again, finally setting up near permanent quarters despite the obvious costs and hardships, all in the name of science. We’ll go back to the Moon too one day – maybe not anytime real soon, but eventually. Your great grandkids will see lunar settlements or outposts like we today see in Antarctica. ET and Earth may have had the same ongoing relationship. We might find we have ET for company on the Moon like we’ve had ET for company on Earth.

Now fast-forward and recall from our mythologies around the world – all races, all cultures, all geographical settlements – the tales of the sky ‘gods’ and beings associated with various constellations and stellar addresses.  Those same ‘gods’, who often get around in aerial ‘chariots’, gave the gifts of knowledge and culture and rudimentary technologies to primitive (hunter-gather) mankind. They stick around to monitor their experiment.

Now fast-forward to 1947 through to the present. The ‘gods’ have become ET, and they are going to keep close tabs on us, since they know that one day, even if thousands of years down the track, we’ll boldly go like they have boldly gone. We have our intelligence gathering agencies; ET has theirs as well.

For egocentric humanity, it’s clear that UFOs, if alien owned and operated, can only be here, on-site, in response to the modern human presence. That’s actually advocated by many pro UFO ETH buffs that how can it be a coincidence that aliens have arrived just at the same time we started playing around with dangerous toys – nuclear weapons; going into space; and reeking environmental havoc upon ourselves. Skeptics counter that for humans to be known by those out there, they can only know of us via our electromagnetic (EM) signals, which propagate outwards out there at light speed. Thus, our EM signals (nuclear blasts, radio/TV broadcasts, radar emissions, etc.) haven’t had much time to get very far out there, because prior to say 1900 Earth was pretty quiet in giving off human technological EM noise. Even our atmospheric pollution, potentially detectable from way out there via spectroscopic analysis, wasn’t really at highly abnormal levels prior to 1900. It’s only in the 20^th Century did it really kick into high gear.

So, if you take 1947 as the start year of the modern UFO era – their arrival date – and assuming they left home as soon as they detected our EM signal then their home has go to be so close by to Earth as to be statistically unlikely in the extreme. Since ET’s home is certainly not within our solar system, then by elimination, that leaves nearby stars. But only subluminal interstellar travel is possible, and even interstellar velocities of say 10% light speed are pushing the envelop. Our closest stellar companions are over four light years away, so it would take ET over forty years to reach us from the closest stellar abode. Add to that the four light years it took our EM signal to reach them in the first place, well that’s about 44 years all up. Subtract that from 1947 – well, 1903 isn’t known for our high intensity radio broadcasts, and radar, TV and nuclear lights are still future technology. Therefore, ET didn’t arrive in 1947 due to any human activity, and since obviously only human activity would attract ET to travel here in the first place – therefore UFOs can not be anything alien! 

The basic assumption that UFOs are here because humans are here is so anthropomorphic (human centered) as to be laughable. Firstly, even if the aliens arrived out of concern to post-1900’s human activities, that doesn’t mean they weren’t already here, if not on-site, in the immediate solar system area, like having a lunar base, or even an orbiting space colony ship as base of operations. One doesn’t have to postulate them being a minimum of over four light years away. Secondly, let’s forget the human element – as per the above argument, Planet Earth has been noted and logged in a galactic database for a minimum of millions of years, more likely as not an order of magnitude greater – billions of years. It’s an egocentric inspired, but just coincidence, that alien UFOs are around when humans dominate Earth’s environment.

A near universal objection to the UFO ETH is that there’s little or no credible evidence, especially physical evidence that any UFO event can be interpreted as an alien spaceship doing its alien flying thing. 

The fact that there exists such a thing as the UFO ETH must suggest that there is some suggestive evidence in support. The UFO ETH only exists, post early 1950’s, is because for the first three to four years of the then ‘flying disc’ or ‘flying saucer’ phenomena, late 1940’s, ‘saucers’ or ‘discs’ were assumed to be terrestrial in origin – secret Soviet devices (to the Americans); secret American devices (to the Russians). When those ideas became untenable, the obvious conclusions were that it was all in the mind; misidentifications, hoaxes, hallucinations etc. But that became as equally untenable as solid case after solid case came in and proved to be unexplainable by any and all terrestrial possibilities. By elimination – well according to Sherlock Holmes, when you’ve eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth – one was forced to at least consider the ETH a plausible alternative. But the illogic of the scientific mind was made crystal clear in the ultimate debunking of the UFO ETH, the University of Colorado Scientific Study into UFOs [the Edward Condon study] which concluded it was all a lot of rubbish – except for the fact that that very study, that very report, couldn’t explain away, with any terrestrial phenomena known, over 30% of the UFO cases it studied. It’s like a jury stating 1/3^rd not guilty; 2/3rds guilty – well the majority ayes have it – let’s carry out the execution. So, what part of the word ‘evidence’ don’t you understand?

Okay, so multi-tens of thousands of eyewitness accounts count for nothing, especially when many of those sightings were by trained observers, and multi-witness cases at that. On that UFO issue, many scientists while happy to accept the accuracy of eyewitness testimony when it provides data that turns a UFO event into an IFO, for some strange reason reject eyewitness testimony when it reinforces the unidentified or unknown status of the UFO event. Go figure!

All of which suggests to me that when it comes to the scientific community and evidence, there is often a double standard employed. For example, even as recently as 2009, a public opinion poll found that a significant (albeit minority) percentage of scientists had a belief in a God that was up close and personal in their lives. There’s not the slightest bit of evidence, physical or otherwise, that God exists.  There’s not one shred of physical evidence for string theory, yet its an accepted area of funded academic research and has been for decades. But that’s getting away from the topic. Anyway, back to the evidence for the UFO ETH.

To be continued…

UFOs & the Anti-ETH: Summation Arguments: Part One

That the scientific communities and scientists in general (there are exceptions) dismiss the UFO ETH (extraterrestrial hypothesis) as pseudoscience and total bunk is understandable, but illogical. The scientists’ anti UFO ETH arguments don’t stand up to logical scrutiny. Here’s some more of their specific objections, and why they are in turn, objectionable. To adequately come to terms with the UFO ETH one needs to have a ‘deep time’ perspective; not just one of here and now or last week, month, year, decade or even centuries ago.

Whether you’re a UFO ETH (extraterrestrial hypothesis) supporter, a UFO ETH debunker, or you don’t give a damn either way about the UFO ETH at all (so then why are you reading this?), you’d be aware that overall the professional scientific community, including for some odd reason SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence) scientists – the very clan who profess an intense interest in ETI – pooh-pooh the very notion of the UFO ETH. Here’s some more of their specific objections, and why they are in turn, objectionable.

Some scientists will argue that we are the proverbial IT – there are no other advanced extraterrestrial civilizations, therefore UFOs can not have anything to with extraterrestrial intelligence.

However, with 13.7 billion years to play with since the origin of our Universe (the Big Bang event); with billions of stars in our own galaxy alone; with billions of galaxies scattered throughout the cosmos each with billions of stars therein, with extra-solar planets being discovered around many of those stars in our own galaxy (and by implication other galaxies as well); with the chemical elements required for life commonplace throughout the Universe; with the principles of Darwinian evolution given as universal, what odds that we are really the proverbial IT?

Of course when it comes down to the UFO ETH it’s only our galaxy we need concern ourselves with. Even I acknowledge that though extraterrestrial civilizations exist in other galaxies, travel times between galaxies quickly exceed logical transit times available. Interstellar travel however is quite another matter. Still, our own galaxy gives us some ten billion years to play around with; billions of stars and no doubt planets, those abundant chemical elements, and Darwinian principles. Again, it would be a very brave soul to suggest again those sorts of statistics that we are, even in our own galaxy, the proverbial IT; not just the new kid on the block, but the first and only kid on the block.

Not even a UFO ETH skeptic SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence) scientist of my acquaintance would argue we’re the proverbial IT – it would make a mockery of his own chosen career path.

Some scientists suggest that while it’s highly probable that extraterrestrial life exists; extraterrestrial intelligence doesn’t. No alien intelligence means no-go to the UFO ETH.

Again, not even respectable SETI scientists would propose this an objection to the UFO ETH since that would undercut their own work. Clearly the evolution of intelligence, albeit being just one of many competing traits for biological survival of the fittest, does have ultimate survival value. The Earth provides a practical example of that as many species can be attributed a reasonable degree of an ability to figure things out, and that it is possible to evolve extremely high levels of intelligence is witnessed by ourselves. If Mother Nature can evolve one biological highly intelligent species, she can do it again, and again, and again on other worlds. 

Lots of arguments against the UFO ETH centre around the proposition that they (the aliens) can’t get from there (wherever there is) to here – interstellar space is the ultimate no-fly quarantine zone and since superluminal velocities (i.e. – Star Trek’s warp drive comes to mind here) are a violation of Einstein’s special theory of relativity (though there’s nothing theoretical about that inconvenience anymore) that takes care of that. ET exists but can’t get here; therefore UFOs can’t be the products of ET.

Now I can not believe this old and totally outdated chestnut is still bandied about. The idiotic assumption here is, in a very anthropological way, is that ET must have a lifespan equal to that of humans. Humans cannot travel to the stars because we can’t travel fast enough in our short life-spans to make the journey from start to finish, and I assume here that if you start the journey you want to be around to finish the journey. Now there is no law in biological science that says an intelligent flesh-and-blood entity must kick-the-bucket after roughly three score and ten years. If you recall from mythology, the cosmic and sky ‘gods’ were (at least from a human perspective) as close to immortal as makes no odds. Quasi-immortality makes interstellar travel quite feasible. Of course any alien intelligence that can visit us will have technologies far beyond our own. Genetic or other forms of bioengineering could artificially extend life-spans by many orders of magnitude. Perhaps flesh-and-blood has morphed into silicon and steel. There’s the standard sci-fi scenarios of the multi-generation starship or hibernation that passes the time away without much additional aging. Then too perhaps a super-civilization of the extraterrestrial type has been able to approach luminal velocities; perhaps have physics and engineering that can go superluminal. But one doesn’t need such extreme possibilities. All it takes is the first initial journey. Once here, our quasi-immortal ET (the ‘gods’ of mythology) sets up shop, say even a lunar outpost. No further interstellar journeys required.   

Obviously it’s unlikely in the extreme that we (humans) would just happen by chance be the lucky generation, after 4.5 billion years have passed Earth by in cosmic isolation, for us to now experience on-site cosmic company. If you were to throw a dart randomly at 4.5 billion balloons, what odds that it would hit a balloon that co-existed with humanity’s existence, even being generous and giving us (humanity) an existence of say two million balloon years, far less hitting the balloon labeled 1947 (the accepted start of the modern UFO era)?

This is IMHO actually the best anti UFO ETH argument going but when taken to its logical conclusion provides the very answer which makes the UFO ETH nearly inevitable. Indeed, it would be utterly extraordinary in the extreme if that tiny niche of terrestrial time, say 1947 to the present, were the first and only niche of terrestrial time to host a visit by extraterrestrial intelligence(s). The obvious answer is that there have been previous niches in time, intervals of time, probably lots and lots and lots of them, when ET paid a visit. ET had had billions of years to randomly (or selectively) explore the (our) galaxy. At 1% light speed it only takes 10,000,000 years to cross the galaxy edge to edge. But the galaxy is ten billion years old. If there’s lots of space-faring alien civilizations, or even if there is just one, they are probably a lot closer to us than the worst case scenario of edge-to-edge (obviously, since we’re not on the galactic edge). Those who have pondered this issue and crunched the numbers, suggest that 10,000 to 100,000 years is a rough estimate of time intervals between random visits from ET. Still, 1947 to date could easily and probably would on probability fall outside that range. Maybe the last random visit was 9,000 years ago, or 90,000 years ago. We’d still have a bit of a wait (one thousand to ten thousand years) for the next call. But, and there’s always a “but”…

To be continued…

UFOs & the ETH: Summation Arguments: Part One

The Fermi Paradox postulates that extraterrestrials should be visiting Planet Earth. That’s the theoretical part of the equation. UFOs provide the counterpoint – the observational part of the equation.

First I’d better define exactly what I mean by a UFO. To me, a bona-fide UFO is any UFO that remains a UFO after comprehensive investigation and analysis by qualified experts have failed to identify the object as any known natural or man-made phenomena. The tag ‘unidentified’ means that the conclusion was that it couldn’t have even been a possible or probable natural or man-made phenomena, but what exactly it was remains totally ‘unidentified’ and probably forever unidentifiable. Observational evidence is suggestive that these bona fide UFOs could be extraterrestrial visitations - the extraterrestrial hypothesis (ETH).

But wait, I hear screams of protest!

One could ague and come to a conclusion that while it is probable aliens would stumble over our humble abode in the cosmos, it’s very improbable that it would happen within our lifetime; with the last couple of generations. It’s vastly more probable a visitation would have happened in ancient times, prehistoric times, maybe millions if not billions of years ago. While there’s something to be said for that, there is the counter argument that having visited once, the ‘tourist attraction’ we call Earth would become ongoing.

There’s more than one sci-fi story published that plots alien scientists charting our newly formed solar system, surveyed Earth of course, about four billions of years ago, left some rubbish behind, and thus spawned the origin of terrestrial life!

Fast forward several billions of years and our alien scientists or explorers (biologists this time) picked up a trilobite or two for their interstellar zoo or museum collection. And I’d bet even aliens might have been fascinated with the dinosaurs!  Perhaps in our hypothetical interstellar zoo, terrestrial dinosaurs continue to strut their stuff, having suffered a pre-historical UFO abduction!

Alas, the odds any physical evidence of such vastly ancient prehistoric visitations or surveys or expeditions would be so rare, eroded away or deeply buried, that such musings will probably forever remain just wild speculations. All witnesses are extinct now!

But moving from millions of prehistoric years ago to more recent prehistoric eras, up through and including ancient history, say within the last 100,000 years, then we might start getting some more concrete pictorial evidence (cave art) or other archaeological, anthropological or mythological evidence – which of course brings us to the topic of ‘ancient astronauts’. All I’ll say on that is that most of the popular literature on the subject is bovine fertilizer or pure balderdash. But I’m not going to be so rash as to go on record as saying all of it is.

There’s a song by country-pop singer Shania Twain that goes something like “That don’t impress me much”. Specifically, when watching ‘ancient astronaut’ documentaries, or even reading the popular literature, I’ve never been impressed by the monuments argument that aliens either built them or helped humans to build them – monuments like Stonehenge or the pyramids (Egyptian or Mesoamerican) or the statutes on Easter Island. That’s selling human abilities short. I’m also not impressed with so called ancient technologies – thousands of year old batteries for example that look about as alien as a Model-T Ford.

What does impress me are various highly anomalous and alien in appearance historical art works – pictures, cave art, paintings, sculptures, etchings, some of massive size like the Nazca line drawings in Peru so obviously designed to be viewed from a high altitude. Also of interest is mythology and comparative mythology that might be suggestive of ‘ancient astronauts’.  These are legitimate and worthy areas for scholarly study, given the importance of the subject. 

So, why the sudden surge in UFO activity in recent generations – 1947 to date? Well, maybe there hasn’t been – a surge that is.

Contrast that with the period 1847 – 1910; or 1747 – 1810. Look at relevant factors like population levels and distribution; the sorts of terrestrial technology that could be misconstrued as alien spacecraft; the technology that can detect UFOs; communication factors; and social factors.

Relative to those eras, the modern UFO era has a far greater population base; the more people, the more sightings. The modern UFO era, unlike previous eras, has airships and aircraft and artificial satellites and flares and searchlights and all that jazz which can generate sightings. The modern UFO era has cameras (still and motion picture) and radar and other technologies that are subject to electromagnetic effects that help to document UFO activity today that couldn’t have been documented 10 or 200 years ago. The modern UFO era, relative to 100 or 200 years prior, has way more communications – books, magazines, radio, TV, other mass media like newspapers, the Internet, films, and so on. If some UFOs are alien craft, the great unwashed is far more cognisant of it than our counterparts living 100 or 200 years ago. Lastly, 100 years ago, even more so 200 years ago, there wasn’t the sort of outdoor nightlife activity we have today. After dark, you went to sleep; up at the crack of dawn. Yet UFOs are more readily detectable at night. It’s easier to spot a bright light against a dark sky – but only if your outside.

For all those reasons, it might be the case that UFO activity hasn’t really changed over historical periods. Then again, maybe it has.  

Now if it ultimately turns out that 100% of UFOs have zilch to do with extraterrestrial intelligence; that there never has been ancient astronauts; that no alien picnickers left behind their garbage billions of years ago; that we never were on the receiving end of a cosmic Johnny Appleseed – if Planet Earth is not in any cosmic database, then maybe we are the proverbial be-all-and-end-all. We are the first intelligence to arise in the Universe – the first, maybe the only. However, that assumption runs counter to the Copernican Principle or the Principle of Mediocrity that in the overall cosmic scheme of things, we are just the average run-of-the-mill. So, let’s not start off violating these cherished cosmological principles, rather go back to the assumption that some UFOs actually reinforce those principles.

Of course it is not sufficient enough for visiting aliens and their interstellar craft (UFOs if you will) to theoretically exist – there’s got to be some kind of actual evidence – and it exists in spades.

There exists a phrase “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence”'. I've seen that in numerous books, and I understand it originates from the late and great Carl Sagan. Were Dr. Sagan alive today I'd take the comments to him, but seeing as how he's no longer available.

Claims require evidence. That's not in dispute. However, the word 'extraordinary' is in the mind of the beholder. What might be an extraordinary claim to you might not be an extraordinary claim to me, and vice versa. Murder is a more extraordinary crime than jaywalking, yet the same evidence (say a security camera film) will convict in both cases. You don't need twice the amount of evidence in a murder trial vis-à-vis being convicted of jaywalking. So, claims, of any kind, require enough evidence to convince anyone with an open mind - no more; no less.

If I, one of the great unwashed, were to make a claim that the double slit experiment provides evidence for the existence of parallel universes, or that a positron was actually nothing more than an electron going backwards in time, that would be extraordinary. If a professional scientist, a physicist, were to make the same claims, it’s not extraordinary presumably because physicists know what they are talking about. Yet it’s the same set of claims. They can’t be both extraordinary and ordinary at the same time!

Many of the greatest and now accepted parts of science started out as an extraordinary claim - like quantum mechanics or relativity theory or the fact that the Earth goes around the Sun. But did these claims really need extraordinary (like double the experimental) evidence vis-à-vis other claims that are now equally parts of the accepted science we find in the textbooks? For open-minded people, especially scientists, such claims probably did not require extraordinary evidence.

Few scientists now dispute the (initially extraordinary) claim of the reality of ball lightning, yet not only is it far rarer than UFO sightings, it has less of a theoretical underpinning than the proposal that some UFOs have an extraterrestrial intelligence behind them. Ball lightning hasn’t been put under a laboratory microscope any more than UFOs have. There are lots of parallels between ball lightning and UFOs for the sociologists of science to ponder. Yet one has credibility, one doesn’t. Why? It makes relatively little sense.

It is said, and there is truth in this, that science and scientists do not have the time and resources to investigate every claim ever made about the natural world. There must be some ways and means of distinguishing reasonable from unreasonable (i.e. – extraordinary) claims. While I don’t have an easy answer to that – though I’ll give one immediately below – I’ll just initially observe that there’s been a lot of seemingly reasonable claims that are now only footnotes in the history of science, and a fair few unreasonable claims that are now part of the bedrock on which our sciences, technology and civilization rests.

However, instead of ordinary vs. extraordinary distinctions, I’d suggest important vs. relatively unimportant claims. Lots of claims, whether proven or unproven, aren’t going to set the world on fire. Others have the potential to make for paradigm shifts in our understanding of the world and the cosmos. The equation UFOs = evidence for extraterrestrial intelligence is such an example. The claim needs to be investigated, yet not requiring massive more investigations than any other sort of scientific puzzle would require.

So, we desire evidence for the extraterrestrial nature of UFOs, not extraordinary evidence.

Sceptics would argue that the burden of proof that extraterrestrials are behind (at least some of) the UFO phenomena lies with the believers – those who claim such is the case. And that’s true. But there’s another side to that coin. Sceptics need to look at what evidence is presented and not have a mind-in-a-closet attitude.

To be continued…

UFOs & Aliens: I Want to Believe: Part Two

A vast majority of people think it’s a total waste of time to search for extraterrestrial life in space – throughout the entire cosmos – not because they’re convinced ET doesn’t exist, but rather that ET has been (ancient astronauts) and is now (UFOs) not only here but up close and personal with Planet Earth and humanity. 

Continued from yesterday’s blog…

What becomes of all those UFO eyewitness reports (sometimes backed up by physical evidence)? Well those qualified to do so, scientists, military personnel (because UFOs were once a national security issue) and others so qualified try to come up with a prosaic answer. They don’t come up with an acceptable answer in all the cases. So then there are the UFO unknowns – the actual hardcore, bona-fide unidentified flying objects. Even the most hardened of UFO sceptics acknowledges that between 5% and 10% of UFO reports turn into hardcore unidentified sightings. When translated over six plus decades, worldwide, that’s one hell of a lot of mysterious residue one has to come to terms with. Why science and scientists, presumably charged with the responsibility of exploring the unknown and figuring out how things work, choose to ignore this massive pile of hardcore unknowns is quite beyond me.  I mean if each and every UFO report that came in was quickly explained away, well everyone should and probably would be sceptical when yet another report hit the fan. But that’s not the case.

The fact, as noted above, what most sceptics readily acknowledge, is that between 5 and 10 percent of all reported UFO incidents remain unidentified after investigation by those qualified to do so. This fact apparently excites the scientific, astrobiology, and SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence) communities not one jot. But, if SETI received out of all radio signals, 5% to 10% unexplained radio signals, (“WOW” signals), that of course would set the SETI community abuzz.

In a similar vein, if 5 to 10 percent of particle interactions were unexplainable by the current standard model of particle physics, that would set the physics community abuzz without question.

If the speed of light varied ever so slightly 5% to 10% of the times it were measured, the special relativity community would be agog, and extremely interested.

If 5 to 10 percent of galaxies showed a discrepancy between their red-shifts and their distances, that would set the cosmology community abuzz.  

So, why the big scientific yawn over the apparently bona fide UFO’s unidentified percentage? Perhaps it might take sociologists who study the sociology of science to pin that one down. There’s a mystery just begging for serious attention here that has the potential for massive ramifications, not just scientific ones.

Now the hardcore unknowns aren’t a ‘possible this’ or a ‘probable that’ or maybe yet some other thing(s) that acquaint yet again to something in terms of a prosaic explanation. The experts haven’t a clue what these 5% to 10% of UFOs are.

So, faced with these hardcore bona fide unknowns, the public focuses on the ETH. That’s understandable as how many other possible explanations for the hardcore can there be?

Okay, maybe it’s time travellers from our future as one alternative. But then hardcore UFO unknowns aren’t clustered around significant historical events that would be must sees – the bread-and-butter of that industry – to tourists and historians from our future.

An early UFO ETH theory was that UFOs were actual living organisms who lived in outer space but now and again would dip into our atmosphere. No biologist could actually explain how such creatures could survive, far less thrive, in the harsh conditions of outer space.

Some suggest that the hardcore represent some sort of totally new natural phenomena, except there’s no even theoretical underpinning for new natural phenomena, and after six decades, well that’s a total failure to come to terms with an easy way out of the hardcore mess. However, natural phenomena wouldn’t exhibit intelligent behaviour in any event, which the hardcore UFOs do. That’s why they often tend to be the hardcore.

Now one might argue that if nine out of ten UFO reports turn out to be prosaic, then the final tenth one will to. That point of view (POV) is seemingly logical, but really illogical. If your footie team wins nine grand finals on the trot, well that’s no reason another team won’t win the next one. Toss heads nine times in a row – the tenth toss is still 50/50, not 100% in favour of heads. Nine out of ten of anything tells you zip about the tenth occurrence.

The mention of eyewitness testimony of course brings to the fore visual images. An image (picture) is worth a thousand words as the saying goes. For visual images to really be effective, they have got to be captured in some form or other. Still photographs and motion pictures come to mind here. There are of course a fair few photographs; alas fewer motion pictures of UFOs – no bona fide examples of actual LGM (the “G” could stand for ‘Gray”) - are present and accounted for. However, films and photographs and fakery are too often associated. But even real motion pictures of ‘lights in the sky’, albeit unidentified ‘lights in the sky’ don’t have quite the same visual impact as some of those from our historical past – not film, but something more durable. It’s a lot harder to explain away images from ancient history – images often carved out of stone or carved into stone.

For example, there are the famous statues on Easter Island. Well, the representations are human, but not quite human enough. If they are a representation of ancestor worship (as is commonly cited) then either the ancestors were very strange or else the stone masons were rather poor carvers, or they were one of the first to have invented abstract art. There’s something screwy somewhere in attributing the Easter Island statues as representing a strictly human form. If not strictly human, what’s the alternative?

You have some of the ancient Egyptian ‘gods’ with jackal and falcon heads – how many humans do you see down at your local shopping mall with animal heads?

The Nazca Lines are world famous. They basically are etchings (representing various animals and other objects) made in the dry desert plains in Southern Peru that, much like crop circles, can only be really appreciated from the air. In fact they were only discovered in the 1930’s from aircraft flying overhead.   There’s no doubt humans constructed the lines, which took a lot of time, effort and energy, but to what purpose? Certainly they were not runways for flying saucers and astronomical alignments and associated explanations fail too. Since they were clearly meant to be seen from the air and since we’re talking about their construction some 400 to 650 years AD – sort of our pre-flight era – then the most logical explanation is that they were art works for the sky gods to see and appreciate. 

Tassili n’Ajjer is located in the Sahara Desert in southern Algeria. It’s famous for its prehistoric art rock paintings, many of which are really, really weird. One archaeologist dubbed one such art work the ‘Great Martian God’. Humans drew the various images of – well what exactly? Many of the images certainly don’t depict anything terrestrial that’s for sure. Just plug in the term ‘Tassili’ into Google Images for examples, and decide for yourself. 

Visoki Dečani is a major Serbian Orthodox Christian monastery located in Kosovo. Within are various murals. On the "The Crucifixion" fresco, painted in 1350, objects similar to UFOs can be found. They represent two comets that look like space ships, with two men inside of them, and are often cited by those interested in ‘ancient astronauts’. The images are certainly striking. You have to decide for yourself if these images are representing really real ‘ancient astronauts’ aerial craft. 

Cylinder Seals date from about 3500 BC in Mesopotamia and surrounding regions. They tell ‘picture stories’ and were engraved on cylinders that could be rolled onto a flat surface like wet clay. The interesting bit is that not only are some images clearly mythological, showing dragons and various gods, but some images are clearly astronomical. Celestial objects abound. No less a scientist than the late Dr. Carl Sagan, is on record (in his co-authored book “Intelligent Life in the Universe”) as noting that some cylinder seals clearly show various extra-solar planetary systems, often in association with specific deities.

There are many, many ancient figurines or statues showing beings something less than what we’d call ‘human’. Of the lot, I personally found some of the most striking to be male and female clay figurines dating from the archaeological period called the Obed time or Obed horizon in Mesopotamia, roughly fourth millennium BC, with insect-like heads or at least eyes. In fact the eyes are very striking, and certainly representing nothing terrestrial – they remind me of the modern depiction of the eyes of the UFO-related greys.  

Speaking of which, there was that immense psychological subconscious reaction to the face of the ‘Grey’ on the cover of Whitley Strieber’s book “Communion”.

The Piri Reis Map is another well known case of something that really shouldn’t be, but is. Piri Reis was a Turkish admiral and cartographer who strutted his stuff in the early 1500’s. The famous map in question shows in considerable detail the coastlines of the Americas, greater detail than exploration of that era would have been possible, plus the opposite side of the Atlantic (which, okay, was pretty well known), but most impressive, parts of coastal Antarctica, a continent which hadn’t yet been discovered (though highly speculated about). However, in fairness, there are enough errors that sceptics can easily dismiss this as evidence of ‘ancient astronauts’ – close, but no cigar.

Then there’s the popular literature.  There was the immense popularity of Erich Von Daniken’s ancient astronaut books – they really rang quite a responsive chord around the world. UFO books tend to sell well too, for example, as noted above Whitley Strieber’s “Communion” and sequels; also Budd Hopkins “Missing Time” and later works. For people to shell out their hard earned bucks for books that are on the fringe of science and acceptability – well, there’s got to be some sort of responsive chord driving this. 

In conclusion, I want to believe? Indeed I do – believe that is!

UFOs & Aliens: I Want to Believe: Part One

A vast majority of people think it’s a total waste of time to search for extraterrestrial life in space – throughout the entire cosmos – not because they’re convinced ET doesn’t exist, but rather that ET has been (ancient astronauts) and is now (UFOs) not only here but up close and personal with Planet Earth and humanity. 

People tend to believe in a whole host of things because it brings them some sort of sense of identity or comfort. For example, you might believe in white supremacy because you’re Caucasian. You might believe the British are best, because you were born, raised and live in London. You believe in ghosts because that’s evidence that there’s a ‘life’ after death. You believe in God (or the gods) because that gives your life a meaningful purpose. You believe in astrology because you know what’s in store for you and can make your plans accordingly. You believe in the positive curing powers of alternative medicine when you’re diagnosed with a terminal illness and given just months to live.

But what does belief in aliens give you? - At best, absolutely nothing positive. Aliens here and now don’t really effect your world view – those set of beliefs or faiths that direct you in your every day-to-day affairs. There’s nothing to be psychologically or emotionally gained from belief that little grey men are walking amongst us, maybe abducting us, unlike say your belief that you had better get your bills paid on time. Now that’s important!

On the other hand, at worst, collectively there’s a case for not believing in aliens – if aliens, then humans aren’t the Big Cheese of the cosmos. If you believe in aliens you lower your own status (as well as the status of humanity as kingpins of the universe).

No one is born believing that ET has established an existence here, so that belief has got to have been acquired based on some sort of evidence.

Public opinion polls from the early to mid 1950’s onwards have shown that a reasonable minority of the public seriously believe that aliens have been and/or are here now. That this is the case despite all the denial that come from the scientific community and other officialdom (the government and the military) is not in any way disputed. It’s not usually a matter of “I want to believe” like Fox Mulder of “The X-Files” as rather ‘I do believe’. Why such belief for such a lengthy period of time? There’s not to be something suggestive that in this case officialdom is wrong – by intentional design or by incompetence.

UFOs vs. evidence for the ETH – there is no absolute smoking gun - yet. I’d be the first to acknowledge that. I’d suggest however that this is a case of where there’s smoke, there’s smoke. The fire has yet to be seen through the smoke. There however has got to be something suggestive about the nature of that smoke to drive lots of people, even some quite intelligent people, to accept the possibility of the UFO ETH. I mean the idea just didn’t pop out of the ether – out of thin air. Something very suggestive is driving it. Yet, as noted, there has been no ‘smoking gun’ proof.

No UFO has crashed in Central Park, NYC – an event which couldn’t be concealed or covered-up.

No ancient tomb or grave site has yielded or contained the remains of an obviously extraterrestrial entity.

No president or prime minister or equivalent has ever announced to the world that their country had alien technology in their possession. 

No Little Green Man (LGM) has landed on the White House lawn and said in traditional fashion “Take me to your leader”.

No exotic metallic alloys have ever been found incorporated in ancient structures like the Egyptian or the Mesoamerican pyramids.

ET can’t telephone home because no mobile phones have been found by archaeologists on their digs and put on display in any museum’s ancient history exhibits.

So belief in ET being here must stem not from one biggie piece of smoking gun evidence but from lots and lots and lots of little clues. That’s much like whodunit murder mysteries. The guilty party is revealed at the end by someone piecing together a lot of small clues that, when put together, when everything falls into place, finally point the finger at the murderer.

We probably innately realise they (ET) should be here – there’s nothing to prevent that from being the case, and lord knows that probability has been reinforced again, and again, and again in sci-fi books, short stories, movies and TV episodes, as well as documentaries of the written or visual kind. But just because they could be here, or should be here, doesn’t translate immediately into belief that they are here. So, why do we believe (well many of us anyway) that that’s the case?

Well for starters there are personal experiences – your own UFO sighting(s) or abduction(s). However, relatively few of us actually have such a personal interaction or close encounter, and in any event personal experiences are well, personal. But if you had one (or more), well a common phrase is “I know what I saw”. Therefore, I believe.

More likely as not it’s the sum total of all the eyewitnesses testimony of others, over six decades worth, worldwide, the sort that is commonplace not only in our daily conversations with others (“I saw Jane Doe and Joe Blow together at lunch last week”) but in legal proceedings in courtrooms – though apparently not allowable in the courtroom of science which demands a body on the slab in the lab.

For eyewitnesses to be convincing, they need to be credible observers, so we’re not talking here about alcoholic bums lying in the gutter; elementary school dropouts who couldn’t tell the difference between astrology and astronomy if their life depended on it; New Age hippies zonked out on the latest designer or party drug; and those, who through no fault of their own are mentally disabled in one way or another.

No, what the great unwashed know of credible UFO sightings come from pilots (military and civilian); astronauts, police officers, professionals like health professionals and medical doctors, lawyers, engineers and yes, even scientists; politicians (okay, maybe not pollies who can’t even lie straight in bed); as well as the average citizen whose word and credibility wouldn’t be under any strain under any other set of circumstance. Even used car salesmen and real estate agents usually qualify as credible observers, though most of all tend to be those people who spend a lot of time outdoors/outside and thus are quite aware or familiar with the sky and associated optical and atmospheric phenomena.

Now if each and every eyewitness to a UFO event were a lone witness, that would or should ring alarm bells and delight the sceptics. Of course that’s not even remotely the case. Not only do you often get a group of witnesses, but often two or more eyewitnesses in two or more separately placed locations – independent verification of events by multi-witnesses from multi-sites.

There’s another form of independent verification. The presence of physical evidence is often, not usually, but often, left behind. UFOs can and do have an impact on the environment. If UFOs are solid objects and some come close to ground level and even land, you’d expect broken tree branches perhaps and ground traces. That box is ticked. You’d expect UFOs, if they can be seen, to be photographed (still pictures) and filmed (motion pictures), evidence even more valuable in the pre CGI and Photoshop era. If UFOs don’t cloak all the time, you’d expect some radar cases – that’s another box ticked. There have been documented cases of people suffering ill effects after a UFO close encounter, sometimes extreme effects akin to radiation exposure. Electromagnetic (EM) effects, like automobile engines cutting out when in the near vicinity of a UFO have been documented more often than is necessary to establish the reality and credibility of the phenomenon. 

To be continued…

UFO Censorship and Cover-Ups: Part One

From nearly day one of the modern UFO era, the subject has been associated and clouded with all sorts of conspiracy theories – official censorship and deliberate cover-ups of information and releases of disinformation (red herrings). Roswell (1947) is often citied as an example, but since I’ve dealt with Roswell before, I’ll focus elsewhere. Still, Roswell was part of the beginning, and in the beginning there were definitely national security and defence issues associated that required security classifications. But once started, censorship and cover-ups, well it’s a slippery slope that’s hard to climb out of.

As the recent and ongoing WikiLeaks saga has demonstrated, as if any demonstration were really needed given such well known historical instances like ‘Watergate’ or ‘the Pentagon Papers’, governments and government officials, sometimes a whole succession of governments and government officials, not only can, but do try to keep secrets from the citizens and taxpayers that ultimately elected those governments and those officials and paid for all those activities now kept secret. And what leaks is probably the tip of the iceberg. There are probably more secrets than declassified or leaked secrets!

Now of course there are some things that need to be kept secret – at least for a time – things central to national defence and security are obvious examples. But some as yet undisclosed secrets of that nature have probably exceeded their usefulness use-by date, but it’s too much effort to release now – who, despite some stuffy academic historians of no consequence cares what was what from years gone by anyway? – and anyway who wants to take unwanted and unnecessary responsibility declassifying stuff? 

But, way too many secrets are secret just because they are, if made public, reveal an embarrassing skeleton in the closet or would reveal a black sheep in the ‘family’ or it’s just a plain diplomatic ‘oops’. I’m sure even ordinary families can relate to those sorts of issues. Once you dig yourself a non-disclosure hole, it’s not always easy to climb out again, but if you’re comfortable in your self-dug hole, why bother trying?

So, on to the issue of UFOs – are UFOs an ever ongoing necessary thing to censure; a classified topic that passed its use-by date a long time ago; or just one of those ‘black sheep’ skeletons-in-the-closet? 

I received an email from a SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence) scientist along the line that cover-ups are the usual excuse for the claim there’s no obvious public evidence for the UFO ETH (ExtraTerrestrial Hypothesis), and that's an argument from ignorance, so it has no force.  It's also implausible that every government in the world is participating in a cover-up. I’m guessing here, but I’d wager that scientist hasn’t ever been in the military (I have) or worked for any defence, security or diplomatic related agencies.

Well, any time the powers-that-be classify, conceal, deny, cover-up things, you’re in the dark so obviously any debate or argument to the contrary by you is an argument or debate from your relative ignorance because you don’t have all of the facts.

1) Disclosures vs. Cover-Ups: There is intense interest in the question of whether or not we are alone in the cosmos. It has been one of the biggest philosophical, cum scientific questions ever. To date, all discussions revolving around the existence of life on other worlds, be it layman, academic, philosophical, political, etc. have remained if not idle speculation, at least educated speculation. The Big Question comes about when life on other worlds is actually discovered. What do those in the know tell those not in the know? To cover-up, or not to cover-up, that is the question.

#Microbial Life on Mars: Viking and/or the Mars Rock (ALH84001): No Cover-up. In fact, the powers that be, scientific and governmental, have been very open about presenting analysis from, for example, the 1976 Viking space probes that landed on the surface of Mars and initially give positives results for current microbial life on the Red Planet. Ditto the possible discovery of fossil microbes in a Martian meteorite than landed in the Antarctic – with the rather dull name of ALH84001. The jury may be still out on Viking and ALH84001, but it was all open and aboveboard. Maybe that’s because Martian microbes, past fossil, or alive in the present, however interesting, aren’t going to cause any revolutions, apart from scientific ones off course.

#ETI at A Distance: SETI: No Cover-up. Since positive SETI results can be verified across international boundaries, no one country can control disclosure that a radio (or optical or IR signal – leakage of beacon) has been detected. SETI scientists have various protocols in place regarding the announcement of discovering the existence of an ETI civilization that’s somewhere ‘out there’, millions if not trillions of miles away. It will be up to the scientists concerned to make the announcement. Replying however, will probably have to take in political realities and will be up to the United Nations.

#ETI Here but not Now: Ancient Astronauts: No Cover-up. The ‘Face on Mars’, spires photographed by the Lunar Orbiter spacecraft on the surface of the Moon, the avalanche of tomes and documentaries on ‘ancient astronauts’, while interesting, probably didn’t alter any voting patterns, effect the stock market, or increase the price of your shopping. Even if some prominent scholar proved the concept of ‘ancient astronauts’ to the satisfaction of, and with the full backing of, the entire academic community and scholarly society in general, it wouldn’t cause any change, even minor, in the day-to-day affairs of the world and her citizens. The powers-that-be would have little, if even that, control over the pronouncements of private academics in any event, at least in most countries.

#ETI Here and Now: UFOs: Cover-up. If alien beings land on the White House lawn with a traditional ‘take me to your leader’ spiel, or start zapping us with photon torpedoes, or if they’re forced to land, or crash-land, in a densely populated area where there are lots of witnesses and cameras, then the question of a cover-up, the need for the powers-that-be to reveal all, is moot and of only academic interest. Apart from that scenario, there is a lot of circumstantial evidence that some nations and their governments have actual physical evidence, hence knowledge of the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence(s) on Earth in the here and now. Roswell comes to mind as an obvious example. Why would a UFO cover-up exist? And why wouldn’t a UFO cover-up ever be negated at a later date? Okay, let’s assume that you are The Big Cheese, the one who knows that UFOs are here and are spacecraft from an advanced extraterrestrial civilization. It’s in your power to reveal or censor that information vis-à-vis the rest of the world. What would you do?

Perhaps incoming administrations aren’t ever briefed or told. The old ‘if they don’t ask, don’t tell’, what they don’t know won’t ever come back to haunt them philosophy, also translated as the less in the loop, the better, could be one reason.

Perhaps everyone in the know, including incoming administrations who are briefed and who have the power to show-and-tell and reveal all, have been convinced of the need for ongoing secrecy (i.e. a cover-up). What might such reasons be?  

Well, it’s hard to say you’re sorry for the past actions of others, and it’s hard to own up to having done something that has caused others injustice, and it’s hard to admit to lying and deceiving your citizens and doing things that just appear outright wrong. Why spoil your lilywhite image – and re-election chances – or your nation’s and predecessor’s reputation.

Well, no government is going to share that sort of knowledge with any other nation, for obvious national security and military advantage reasons. Thus, you don’t tell anyone, be they your allies or your citizens. As time goes by, it becomes even harder to admit to having done this.

No government is going to admit to its citizens (and thus to the rest of the world) that it has no control over its airspace and territory. They may know they don’t, but you’re not ever going to hear them broadcast that fact.

Any government admitting to its populace and the rest of the world that an advanced ETI civilization is in close proximity to ours with unknown motives is adding one hell of a knuckleball into a game situation that’s already close to the brink. There’s enough major political and economic uncertainty and trauma in the world without introducing another loose cannon such as extraterrestrials-in-our-backyard if this can be avoided.

2) The Official UFO Cover-Up: It might be somewhat possible for one country’s government to keep one or a few UFO incidents (crashes, etc.) that by chance fell into their laps first under wraps and hence keep their citizens in the dark as to the reality of ETI. And the motive, as hinted above, is with respect to the utilization of acquired alien technology. However, in the broader context, it staggers the imagination to suggest or believe that every government, and subsequent change of government, elected or otherwise, including every knowledgeable government official over 60 years, in every country in the world, would or could conspire collectively to do the same. The odds that every nation would pursue that same policy independently are so greatly against as to also stretch credibility.

Since it all boils down to individuals. Over the years one would have to believe that thousands to tens of thousands of those in-the-know wouldn’t blow the biggest story of the millennium, especially when on their death beds via death-bed confessions.  If just one current (or ex) prime minister/president/premier/king, etc. in just one country changed sides and spilled the beans…

In any event, no individual, no government, no country has any control over that ETI may, or may not, do. If Roswell had been Central Park in New York City in broad daylight, who could cover it up? If UFOs choose to hover over major inhabited locations, ala “Independence Day”, what official, government or country could prevent their citizens from knowing about it?

There are several solutions to the cover-up scenario. Firstly, there are no ETI; therefore no cover-ups were ever necessary. Secondly, ETI might be here, but there have been no UFO incidents, no acquired alien technology that have required the perceived need for an official cover-up. Thirdly, there have been UFO incidents, but so few and far between that a long term cover-up was possible. Lastly, there is a global conspiracy policy, a co-operation carried out by every nation in the world since day one to prevent the great unwashed from learning about the existence of ETI (for whatever reason – prevent panic, etc.), and there have been no deviations from that policy ever and no rouge individuals bucking the system for fame or fortune or because it was the right thing to do.

While one of the first two alternatives seems most probable, I think there is enough evidence to make the third alternative the most credible. Certainly the last one is so far out in left field that in fact it’s right out of the ball park.

Regarding the question of censorship and cover-ups over things alien in nature, as noted above, things like Martian microbes are too inconsequential to try to hide; ‘ancient astronauts’ are too old for a government to worry about; SETI aliens (if SETI succeeds) are too far away to worry about; but UFOs are a different kettle of fish. The possibility that highly advanced aliens with unknown motives might be present here and now – well can you imagine any government admitting to the great unwashed that they really have no control over their airspace! Any government that had, by accident, obtained alien technology would certainly not share that information with anyone, including allies, and thus wouldn’t admit same to their citizens.  Of course not all countries and their respective governments may even have the appropriate data which to cover-up. You can’t hide what you don’t know about in the first place.  

3) Freedom of Information (FOI): Why is it, if UFOs are total pseudoscience nonsense, that so many individuals have had to resort to Freedom of Information Act actions (in the United States in particular) in order to get official UFO related government documents, many of which, if released, have large portions and chunks blacked out? Further, not all FOI requests succeed. Why indeed if UFOs are just ‘silly season’ fodder claimed by the sceptics? 

To be continued…

UFOs: What a Load of Rubbish

If E.T. is (UFOs), and/or was (ancient astronauts) here, then there would be alien fossils or artifacts left behind, even if it’s just E.T.’s garbage and little else. Unfortunately, there’s no such undisputed fossil or artifact evidence. Not one bit of E.T.’s litter to be had and put under the microscope. Now is this a legitimate argument that rules out any visitations and somewhat lengthy stays by extraterrestrials to our humble abode, Planet Earth? If there is no UFO rubbish, is the UFO extraterrestrial hypothesis (ETH) rubbish?

Pro-UFO (as in supporting the UFO extraterrestrial hypothesis) and ancient astronaut buffs are happy to claim evidence for extraterrestrials having been, or even now are, as just plain folk, tourists, scientists, colonizers, whatever, sharing with us this Third Rock out from the Sun.  Now a logical objection to this scenario is that there’s no obvious extraterrestrial detritus or garbage sites (kitchen middens) or ruins, etc. they left behind. There’s no fossil evidence for any non-terrestrial critter or of the mythological and possible extraterrestrial hybrids (like centaurs, the sphinx or mermaids). There are no skeletons of E.T. itself thus far uncovered. We’ve yet to find the burial remains (if any) of the alien Cyclops.

That’s not to say there aren’t some pretty weird fossils in the geological record - within the strata of the rocks – but nothing that ultimately can’t be interpreted in terrestrial and Darwinian evolutionary terms. Trilobites were terrestrial.

Of course as any palaeontologist is happy to point out, what fossils we do have amount to a tiny fraction of those still existing within the geological rock record; all fossils (discovered or not) are but an incredibly tiny fraction of all those critters (including plants) that once upon a time got fossilized. Of those that got fossilized, many remain buried, but many have since been destroyed by natural forces; that subset, all those potentially undiscovered fossils, or fossils that no longer exist, are in turn but a super ultra tiny fraction of all critters who have ever lived and died. Most (nearly all) critters when they die serve as food for something else, even if just bacteria. They get biodegraded in one way or another – dust-to-dust and ashes-to-ashes. Translated, the odds that one lone (out of trillions) Joe Trilobite will ever have been fossilized discovered and ultimately grace a museum display is astronomically against. So, that would have to apply to E.T. as well. There might well exist buried in the ground some bona fide E.T. artefact, even an E.T. itself, but that does nobody any good if that artefact remains buried or more likely as not, has been destroyed over geological eons by various and destructive natural geological processes.

In summary, if any such extraterrestrial artefacts and fossils exist, they are so few in number, so eroded and weathered and buried and biodegraded that the proverbial-needle-in-the-proverbial-haystack is easy pickings by comparison. If anyone is familiar with the History Channel’s documentary series “Life After People”, infrastructure when left unattended to the mercy and forces of nature and ravages of time don’t last or survive all that long before crumbling to dust. It’s said that ‘man fears time, but time fears only the pyramids’. However, even so, it’s obvious that time has in fact taken its toll on those ancient wonders at Giza in Egypt. In another 50,000 years, even if ten times that, even the pyramids will have been recycled back to sand as the wind and rain and pollution and earthquakes do their destructive things.

Still, maybe an amateur archaeologist or palaeontologist or just plain lucky prospector or individual who happens to look at the right spot at the right time might stumble onto the find of the century – E.T. Actually it would be the find, not just of the century, but of all time.

Those same natural geological forces and biological agents would also strut their natural recycling and breakdown stuff on E.T.’s waste. But, in addition, E.T. can and does have the option of removing their detritus off the planet. One also needs to ask; would we of necessity recognize and distinguish E.T.’s rubbish from all other forms of human rubbish? Would there be any obvious differences that would suggest extraterrestrial rubbish is somehow different from human rubbish? If we wouldn’t immediately jump to a conclusion that a metal bolt we found was extraterrestrial, would we then go to the trouble and submit it to complex analysis, analysis that would be required to confirm that this rubbish wasn’t ordinary rubbish but extraordinary rubbish?  Lack of E.T.’s garbage is not evidence of a lack of E.T.

The lack of extraterrestrial rubbish dumps and artefacts could well be that E.T. cleaned up after themselves (unlike prone-to-litter humans on which a lot of human prehistory is based – excavations of our ancient garbage dumps, technically called kitchen middens, etc.). The E.T. ‘gods’ (ancient astronauts) took all of their stuff with them when they left, including the end products of their genetic experiments (apart from their ultimate final product – we humans and our hominoid ancestors which had died out on their own), the hybrid half & halves (like the Minotaur) of our mythology.

Unless we humans start launching our garbage into space, say the ultimate incineration in the solar furnace; well let’s just say that option is going to increase waste disposal rates several thousand fold and therefore isn’t a realistic option – for us. Therefore, we have little option but to use Planet Earth as a garbage dump – much to the delight of archaeologists who base much of ancient human history on just such detritus. But of course, as noted earlier, time, natural forces and biological agents ultimately deal with most forms of human waste – solid, liquid and gaseous.

There’s yet another solution to a lack of E.T.’s rubbish. A technologically advanced E.T. is probably equally advanced in recycling technology. If you undertake interstellar voyages you’d better be damned efficient at recycling. Anyway, I don’t recall anyone in ‘Star Trek’ for example leaving behind their litter – an artifact, maybe like a book on Chicago’s gangsters yes, but not rubbish! Even that book was a violation of the Prime Directive! E.T. would pay closer attention to rules and regulations.

Whether extraterrestrial artefacts have been eroded away by time or whether the aliens nearly removed or recycled their detritus, any and all remaining physical evidence as interpreted as evidence for E.T. is therefore evidence from our more modern eras, not the geological past. That evidence might be contained within human mythology or human archaeological relics that depict in one way or another the ‘gods’, entities that could be alien beings – figurines, artworks, monuments, etc. or the half & halves hybrids (like the stone monument of the Sphinx that rests near the trio of those great but crumbling pyramids on the Giza Plateau in Egypt). However, any archaeologist worth his or her salt will tell you that these are all the works of humans – works by man. Some out-of-place artefacts have been discovered but while anomalies or curiosities, they aren’t so totally extraordinary as to make a solid case for the existence of aliens. But, in conclusion to that observation that all roads that point to extraterrestrial ‘gods’ were paved by humans, well, absence of direct evidence linking extraterrestrials on Earth isn’t the same as evidence of extraterrestrials absence on Earth.  

But speaking of artifacts related to E.T. or ancient astronauts, there have been lots of authors, quite apart from Erich von Daniken, who have made careers out of pointing out archaeological evidence suggestive of E.T. Now clearly much of that is embellishment and wishful thinking and often plain nonsense, but, as most of life’s little mysteries are, this isn’t an either/or situation. There are many shades of gray here and I’ve seen quite a few artifacts, especially images that are quite suggestive of an E.T. in our past, and of course if past tense, why not present tense? Now throw in that mythology to complement the archaeology…

Finally, consider your own environment – home, work, community. Within that sphere that you exist in for the most part, what proof do you have that meteors exist? Has any meteorite landed in your back yard; crashed into your place of employment or for that matter anywhere within your day-to-day environment? What about an aircraft? You see these strange flying objects all the time yet you find no artifact of them, an artifact falling to earth in your back yard, your place of employment, or within your community. You probably have no actual physical piece of evidence to prove meteors or aircraft exist. It’s all just an eyewitness reality on your part. Of course if you claim to see a ‘shooting star’ or a Boeing 747 fly overhead; no one is likely to rubbish your sighting. So, can we rubbish UFOs just because there are no artifacts to be conveniently had, rather just eyewitness testimony in the main?

And so, based on your own patch of turf, you have as much in the way of artifacts for E.T. as you have for meteors or airplanes (unless you have been unfortunate enough to really anger the gods and have a plane or meteorite land on your roof).

But wait, what about that July 1947 UFO crash at Roswell, New Mexico and other alleged incidents involving UFO crashes? Unfortunately, even if true, the alleged extraterrestrial artifacts are not in the hands of the scientific community. There are no peer-reviewed papers in scholarly journals on the studied remains. There’s no literature full stop in existence that isn’t controversial. The alleged artifacts aren’t on display in museums. Only the need-to-know elite have access, and they’re not talking. So, Roswell is a yes, but as proof positive, it’s a no – at least so far.

However, there are modern UFO artifacts of sorts. In geology, not all fossils are bones or shells. In fact not all fossils are even remains of living things, but rather events. For example, there are fossilized rain drop impressions in now solid rock; ditto ripple marks. But with respect to former living creatures, there are fossils of just their burrows, and more frequently, just their footprints. A UFO ‘footprint’ is akin to a ground trace left behind after a UFO landing, like say the Socorro, New Mexico landing on 24 April 1964 as witnessed by local police officer Lonnie Zamora. Magnetic traces left behind on metal objects like automobiles or physiological effects incurred on human (or plant and animal) tissue is something else that can be dealt with and analyzed in a laboratory. So, in one manner of speaking, there are UFO ‘artifacts’.

So hunting for UFO or ancient astronaut artifacts, is akin to the old needle-in-a-haystack quest. But that’s something scientists employed in the scientifically legitimate Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence (SETI) quest can identify with. That needle/haystack argument is their fallback position when SETI scientists are pressed or pressured into explaining why they haven’t themselves detected E.T. (albeit out there and not here) in over five decades of searching the heavens for that artificial radio beam or optical beacon. They would state, and rightly so, that absence of evidence is not the same thing as evidence of absence. And so that pithy saying too assists in coming to terms why UFOs (and ancient astronauts) are not rubbish. Absence of E.T.’s garbage is not the same thing of necessity as evidence of E.T.’s absence.