Do you believe potentially some UFO sightings are actually of alien origin?

[Van Rijn]

I don’t know, do Americans today have more of an obsession with alien invasions than elsewhere?

I'd be curious to see how many people have an obsession with alien invasion. I see it as a classic science fiction theme, but I've seen stories (written, TV and movies) from authors of various countries for decades, and I don't feel there's been much of an increase in recent years. I'd say that a bigger theme in science fiction and fantasy in, say, the last 15 years is the idea of the apocalypse, but that is as often due to people, zombies, environment, disease, or whatever as aliens. (That isn't a new theme either, but I've gotten a bit tired of the apocalyptic stories, and would like to see more positively themed stories).

[DaveC426913]

No evidence, nothing that would stand up in a court of law. I don't give a fig for internet opinion, so no.

UFOs are just that; unidentified. You could also claim it's faeries, ghosts, super-powered metahumans, or Santa Claus in the off season. There's not only no evidence, there's no logical reason for pasting "alien" into a completely empty pigeonhole.

I'm not really comfortable with the poll question. My response is that I don't rule out the possibility that a UFO claim could be associated with something of alien origin, but I don't see sufficient evidence to believe that any existing UFO claims actually are associated with something of alien origin.

Exactly. All these phrasing of "is it possible?". Sure, it is possible, especially given an unlimited and increasingly unlikely set of circumstances. So what? It is possible that some random person will walk up to me tomorrow and give me $10,000,000; it would not violate any known laws of physics. But I'd be an idiot if I quit my job today based on that possibility.

I interpreted the question a little more openly.

The question is: "do you believe" some of them are. i.e. whether or not we can find sufficient evidence for a positive ID.

I'll posit a whimsical thought experiment, to get at the nature of "believe":


A silent benefactor offers to put a million dollars of his own money in trust, with accruing interest, payable to your great-to-the-nth offspring, on the condition that you bet the entire amount on whether at least some sightings of UFOS are bona fide alien intelligence.

Even though we have no answer now, it's not implausible that, in 500 years, the question will be resolved effectively conclusively:
1] We examine a downed UFO and find an alien
or
2] Our surveillance has gotten so sophisticated that 100% of all sightings come back as explained (not explainable, but are actually explained). This zero false account occurs for millions of sightings, over enough years that they get bored and reach a solid conclusion.

Assume the contract specifies whatever reasonable conditions you feel you need, within the spirit of the deal.

So, your great-to-the-nth grand-children will receive untold wealth if you bet correctly. It costs you nothing. But you're a betting man, and you can't resist a bet. Especially with someone else's money.

Which way do you bet?


Note: Intercepting the usual "I wouldn't bet because X reason or Y reason". If you don't want to humour the conceit of the thought experiment, no need to flaunt your cunning.

[Noclevername]

I interpreted the question a little more openly.

The question is: "do you believe" some of them are. i.e. whether or not we can find sufficient evidence for a positive ID.

I'll posit a whimsical thought experiment, to get at the nature of "believe":


A silent benefactor offers to put a million dollars of his own money in trust, with accruing interest, payable to your great-to-the-nth offspring, on the condition that you bet the entire amount on whether at least some sightings of UFOS are bona fide alien intelligence.

Even though we have no answer now, it's not implausible that, in 500 years, the question will be resolved effectively conclusively:
1] We examine a downed UFO and find an alien
or
2] Our surveillance has gotten so sophisticated that 100% of all sightings come back as explained (not explainable, but are actually explained). This zero false account occurs for millions of sightings, over enough years that they get bored and reach a solid conclusion.

Assume the contract specifies whatever reasonable conditions you feel you need, within the spirit of the deal.

So, your great-to-the-nth grand-children will receive untold wealth if you bet correctly. It costs you nothing. But you're a betting man, and you can't resist a bet. Especially with someone else's money.

Which way do you bet?


Note: Intercepting the usual "I wouldn't bet because X reason or Y reason". If you don't want to humour the conceit of the thought experiment, no need to flaunt your cunning.

2. By then I estimate that our ability to gather, compare, and analyze information via networked machines will have reached a peak capable of actually fulfilling those conditions.

[Jens]

I would say you don’t need to be a betting man to answer, but you have something to gain and nothing to lose. I think I’d bet on true just because the conditions are easier. If even one turns out to be true, while you have to demonstrate them all wrong to win the other way, and I kind of doubt that you will get a consensus that you’ve shown them all wrong. Not that I would expect to win, though.


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[DaveC426913]

2. By then I estimate that our ability to gather, compare, and analyze information via networked machines will have reached a peak capable of actually fulfilling those conditions.

That doesn't change anything though. Aliens will still be aliens, no matter how advanced we get.

You didn't answer. How would you bet?

[DaveC426913]

I would say you don’t need to be a betting man to answer, but you have something to gain and nothing to lose. I think I’d bet on true just because the conditions are easier. If even one turns out to be true, while you have to demonstrate them all wrong to win the other way, and I kind of doubt that you will get a consensus that you’ve shown them all wrong. Not that I would expect to win, though.

1] Right. Only one needs to be genuinely alien. But most participators think that's balanced by it being incredibly low odds.

2] Your answer is essentially trying to "game" the system. In the spirit of the question: (the premise that we can eventually know the correct answer), which way would you bet?

[Jens]

2] Your answer is essentially trying to "game" the system. In the spirit of the question: (the premise that we can eventually know the correct answer), which way would you bet?

Given the premise that we will discover the truth one way or the other, I would vote that we would discover there were no visitations. Because I don’t believe there have been any.


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[Noclevername]

That doesn't change anything though. Aliens will still be aliens, no matter how advanced we get.

You didn't answer. How would you bet?

On 2. I answered in post #63, perhaps you missed that.

[publiusr]

The original alien invasion story was War Of The Worlds. British, not American. Of course they have their own Colonial history...

A novel from their end of things would end "and we would have gotten away with it too if it weren't for these meddling microbes"

If an alien craft of size came in--then it would be like Oumuamua in that astronomers would be the first to see it and KNOW it as an interstellar object--no schmoe looking up and seeing lights.

[Noclevername]

A novel from their end of things would end "and we would have gotten away with it too if it weren't for these meddling microbes"

An American version would be a Hollywood movie, not a novel. There'd be an Action Hero, a Love Interest, and the disease that killed the aliens would be whipped up by the same scientist that had warned everyone about the aliens and not been believed.

[Chuck]

Maybe every unexplained light in the sky is from a different alien race and they've become bogged down in debates about how best to do away with us.

[Noclevername]

And this is my main objection to us having ever been visited (my bold). Unless some advanced technological species has somehow figured out how to cover large distances extremely fast, or have extremely long life cycles then I don't see how they/it could ever reach us. even if they are from a very local other solar system the distance to cover is immense. The universe could be teeming with advanced life, but are completely (practically) cut off from each other due to the vastness of space-time.

A travelling civilization on generation ship(s) is more plausible to me than FTL. Then their lifetimes won't be an issue; they'd bring "home" with them like a snail carrying its own shell. But such a means of travel would not lead to blurry fly-by UFOs, they'd arrive like a circus train... Everyone would see them coming.

[cosmocrazy]

A travelling civilization on generation ship(s) is more plausible to me than FTL. Then their lifetimes won't be an issue; they'd bring "home" with them like a snail carrying its own shell. But such a means of travel would not lead to blurry fly-by UFOs, they'd arrive like a circus train... Everyone would see them coming.

Ideal if you want to colonise a new planet, but not much use for field trips. The only way really is finding a way to either shorten the distances, i.e wormholes/warp drive or shorten the time i.e light speed (or at least a very high percentage of it 99.999+%). Again this is assuming similar life cycles and limitations to ourselves.

[Noclevername]

Ideal if you want to colonise a new planet, but not much use for field trips. The only way really is finding a way to either shorten the distances, i.e wormholes/warp drive or shorten the time i.e light speed (or at least a very high percentage of it 99.999+%). Again this is assuming similar life cycles and limitations to ourselves.

But the point was that they have their "colony" already on board, they'd only need to stop for resources. Not a "field trip" but a permanently nomadic society. They could go slow and not mind because "home" goes wherever they go.

[DaveC426913]

On 2. I answered in post #63, perhaps you missed that.

Yes. I did. Didn't know what the 2 was for.

[deadie148]

After all, our understanding of Nature itself could be wrong.

I have never really been a fan of when people say things like this. It's a kind of statement that seems to pop up often enough that it grinds my gears a little. Well, maybe more than a little when it's used in a discussion about UFOs. It comes across as a sort-of 'god-of-the-gaps' excuse for Ufologists in addition to seriously downplaying or flat out invalidating the whole of human endeavour in trying to understand the universe we live in.

QM and GR make stunningly precise predictions regarding the nature of our physical reality at every scale imaginable. Any new paradigm breaking models to come in the future are only going to have more and more precision. If something was truly fundamentally wrong with our understanding then we wouldn't possibly be where we are today. Humans are pretty smart after all.

As for the OP, I do not believe any UFO sighting can be explained by extra-terrestrial intelligence of any variety.

[Jens]

I have never really been a fan of when people say things like this. It's a kind of statement that seems to pop up often enough that it grinds my gears a little. Well, maybe more than a little when it's used in a discussion about UFOs. It comes across as a sort-of 'god-of-the-gaps' excuse for Ufologists in addition to seriously downplaying or flat out invalidating the whole of human endeavour in trying to understand the universe we live in.

QM and GR make stunningly precise predictions regarding the nature of our physical reality at every scale imaginable. Any new paradigm breaking models to come in the future are only going to have more and more precision. If something was truly fundamentally wrong with our understanding then we wouldn't possibly be where we are today. Humans are pretty smart after all.

As for the OP, I do not believe any UFO sighting can be explained by extra-terrestrial intelligence of any variety.

I understand where you're coming from. Actually, just to clarify, I have never been a fan of it either. I really meant that as a point that I think we have to concede in absolute terms, though I am a fairly clear non-believer in things like UFOs and faster than light travel. I do find it irritating when people say "you can't say that they don't exist, because you can't be 100% sure," because although I think that's impossible to deny, the implication often is that it's like a 50-50 thing, which it isn't. It reminds me of a great clip from John Oliver visiting CERN (the part at 3:10), which is hilarious but sad.

[Barabino]

The original alien invasion story was War Of The Worlds. British, not American. Of course they have their own Colonial history...

yes, but british Colonialism used to settle in the tropics a limited number of rich residents, who lived there exploiting (relatively mildly) the majority of local brown people... a mundane plot without drama overtones exploited in SJW sci-fi allegories... :no:

[ravens_cry]

Currently known means of traversing from star to star require lots of energy. Our infrared telescopes would spot the radiators, pouring out gigawatts of thermal energy. Yet, we don't see that.
I'd like to believe, but it doesn't seem plausible to me.

[Barabino]

I already feel nostalgic for the nasty (but attractive) aliens of V (2009) tv series... too bad, we're not going to be invaded by cold sadistic brunettes like Morena Baccarin...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFCaTbj4_2c

[swampyankee]

I already feel nostalgic for the nasty (but attractive) aliens of V (2009) tv series... too bad, we're not going to be invaded by cold sadistic brunettes like Morena Baccarin...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFCaTbj4_2c

But she was so nice in Firefly....

[Spacedude]

Yeah but she went bad girl again in Stargate.......and it seems she prefers to go both ways in Gotham.

[Barabino]

UFOs are just that; unidentified. You could also claim it's faeries, ghosts, super-powered metahumans, or Santa Claus in the off season. There's not only no evidence, there's no logical reason for pasting "alien" into a completely empty pigeonhole.

I mostly agree... except that fairies sound unreal because I positively don't believe in them since before childhood... instead "aliens" are possible IN THEORY (although they can't visit earth frequently: interstellar travel is a big problem) and so it seems possible, at first glance

[Noclevername]

I mostly agree... except that fairies sound unreal because I positively don't believe in them since before childhood... instead "aliens" are possible IN THEORY (although they can't visit earth frequently: interstellar travel is a big problem) and so it seems possible, at first glance

A hypothetical "fairy" could be an interesting speculation itself, but not suited to this thread.

[Barabino]

David Brin explored it in Otherness (1994)...