After a long break from UFO reading,

[Chuckleberryfinn]

When I first became interested in UFOs about 5 years ago, I had no doubt that extraterrestrials were among us, flying about here and there, abducting people, appearing over the white house in the fifties, engaging our military aircraft. I remember what I used to justify this position. I had my top 5 cases commited to memory, with a plethora of evidence to support each one, and I engaged anyone in argument who disagreed. I even cornered a philosophy prophesor who teaches a class on “science vs psuedoscience,” after reading his course description in which he called UFOs absurdly stupid psuedoscience, and would not let him leave until he endured a twenty minute lecture in which I presented all of my best evidence. Now, after not having paid much attention or thought to UFOs over the last 3 years or more, I have asked myself what I think, now that the excitement of the initial interest has worn off, like the early rush of a new relationship.

There are, it is uneqiuvocal, some very bizarre cases. Multiple, independent witnesses have seen things that defy conventional explanation. Sometimes, radar even confirms these witness sightings, such as in the 1986 JAPAN airlines incident over Alaska.
Tell me if I’m wrong, but that’s all we know for sure – right? All we know for sure is that people have seen bizarre, apparently technological objects for which there is no conventional explanation? Anything else as to what they are – that is entirely speculative. Right? Does anyone on this board still believe that they are aliens? I am not trolling. I am just trying to get an idea as to where people on this board, perhaps some of you from back when I used to be a regular poster, stand on the issue.

O’Brien, I am interested in this so –called “trickster” agent. It’s a fascinating concept. I had an idea once, called “cosmic parasitosis,” in which I speculated that some unknown entity, for all intents and purposes an ageless being, but possibly having began at some point, stumbled upon our strange world and, not having much else to do, decided to picnic for a few hundred or thousand years, popping in here or there, tricking people to amuse itself – possibly to satisfy some psychotic need for something vaguely resembling companionship. Maybe it’s a lonely being, desperately scouring the universe for a like mind but, not finding any, settling for pranking the locals. Yes? Is your trickster a Robin Goodfellow type of being, like in the Shakespeare play? Fun and games? Or is there a much darker, much more sinister thing going on? More like some calculated agenda that involves deception and subsequent, for lack of a better term, “harvesting?” What is the trickster? One entity? More? A civilization loose in the cosmos, pranking the local primitives? Satan? What is going on? It’s fascinating.

What are yalls thoughts on Raymond Fowler’s idea about these things being actual angels, using technological devices, or what appears to be such, in order to carry out some specific “global maintenance” agenda. Are the UFOs angelic beings charged with maintaining earth? What do yall think these days? Any responses are welcome.

 

[boomerang]

Tell me if I’m wrong, but that’s all we know for sure – right? All we know for sure is that people have seen bizarre, apparently technological objects for which there is no conventional explanation?

Welcome back, Chuckle. And yes, I'm afraid that pretty well sums up what we (most of us anyway) can say with confidence about this phenomenon. Trace evidence such as radar tapes, changed soil and vegetation samples, shed some additional light.

 

[tyder001]

I first stumbled across this board a few years ago after finding the podcast. I think it was linked from another site which is no longer friendly to this site. If the so called ufologist fight the way the "fans" do then no wonder they don't find much in the way of proof. But, I digress. I was actually looking for more of a paranormal talk and discussion site at the time. I never had that much interest in the nuts and bolts of ufo's. I got caught up in the conversation and before you know it I've been here awhile. Anyway, I have found nothing linked here or discussed here in these forums that has advanced more than smoke and mirrors. Right now, I am still very, very skeptical about aliens and abduction. People like Lesley Kean and the O'hare and Brownville sightings do give me pause and so I keep an open mind about it. I honestly don't have a dog in this hunt. I have no preconceived need to find the aliens. I have no worldview that would be shattered by finding the aliens. I do have a worldview but I find that truth is truth no matter how much yelling and debating, mudslinging and name calling people do. So, I gotta put myself in the skeptic catagory in relations to u.f.o.'s.

 

[Angel of Ioren]

I'm a big time skeptic on everything paranormal, including UFOs, and I identify with people that some here may think of as the enemy (Carl Sagan is one of my heroes, as is James Randi). However, I can't be that bad since Gene lets me be part of the moderation team. Anyway, when it comes to UFOs, my interest in the topic lies in why people are so convinced it's alien, whether it be something they see or an experience they have. I've had my own personal "abduction" scenario, but I wonder why I have no trouble saying it was a vivid dream and sleep paralysis, whereas as others refuse to do so.
As for unidentified objects in the sky, I have no issue with leaving them as that - unidentified. No proof exhausts that they are alien, and with human memory being as crummy as it is, I have little confidence in eye witness testimony, regardless of who it's coming from.
Once someone shows me a raw video or film of something truly spectacular, that's when I'll change my mind on that. I'm quite open minded - if I wasn't I would never have changed my opinion on this topic, which I have.

 

[tyder001]

On this subject I'm even more skeptical. I would have to see it and touch it and experience it for myself. No amount of video or trace landing sites or even experts would convince me.

 

[tyder001]

I gotta be honest here. I do believe that people have experiences in life. But, I have a hard time with aliens passing people though walls and up through the roof and into a ship. I have a hard time buying that they come into your room and mess with you and even quiet the person next to you and your animals and then leave little tracings to entice you with. I do think something is going on with people. But, I don't think it is an alien armada waiting just outside the line of site of earth. But, I did mention experience and I have seen some things in the sky that don't seem to be conventional aircraft. But, that doesn't mean they are from another world. The jury is still out.

 

[Bob Watson]

I am a skeptic I veiwed UFOs as tricks or hoaxs. Untill jan 16th 1998 when I saw an unknown craft in the sky over madison wi. I began a lifelong search for answers of what I saw. I found plenty of evidence but I found plenty of fraud UFOS exist. Something is there to be seen. I just needgh to find out what. Aliens? ,maybe although distances in space prohibate long space travel. Time travel seems to be one answer. I'm open to the angel or demon thought. But why look like a black triangle?

 

[Sentry]

I found plenty of evidence but I found plenty of fraud UFOS exist.

What's strange to me is that all the frauds and hoaxes seem to be centered around portraying UFOs as extraterrestrial in origin. I wonder, are the fakes shaping public opinion or is it the opposite?

 

[Sean Elifritz]

I'm a lot more skeptical than I use to be. All the hubbub over David Jacobs and Budd Hopkins that erupted not so long ago coupled with the Petit-Rechain pic being a hoax nearly knocked me right out of the subject. I've been wrong and made to feel a fool when it comes to UFOs more than I have been with any other subject that I've spent more than a minute thinking about and it was really becoming too much. Some of the arguments I got into online regarding Jacobs in particular, after I had some time to reflect on them, are especially bothersome to me. But it's still a handful of close encounter cases that keeps me coming back for even more punishment. I continue to want good explanations for Kelly Cahill, Betty and Barney Hill (Lots of attempted explanations for this one but I've found none of them convincing so far), Allagash, Pascagoula, and heck, even Travis Walton (Some problems with his case but as of right now the positives outweigh the negatives).

 

[ALPHA ROMEO UNIFORM]

Yeah have to agree Sean ,

 

[mike]

Its hard to put into words, but we are not discussing, what we are not discussing.

Its hard to paint a picture of a null concept because when you try, its no longer a null concept.

But to put it another way we wouldnt be talking about UFO's unless something were happening

I still come back to the idea that the universe is unimaginably immense, and that the model we see here, is likely to be repeated elsewhere, but has ive highlighted in my transbiological hypothesis , there may be more to it than our perceptions as filtered by a biological existance.

We interpret the data via that filter, but it may be more complex than that.

Looking down into what we know is easy, looking up into the unknown is hard, but with imagination not impossible

 

[boomerang]

Looking down into what we know is easy, looking up into the unknown is hard, but with imagination not impossible

This is a key point. We historically look "down" in analysis of species less intelligent than we. Society has then too often concluded that humans are at the top of the cosmic food chain. When in fact, we be may be just one sliver in a vast spectrum of intelligence, the higher portions of which know our place in the scheme of things, while we do not.

This is not a new idea. But taking it seriously is difficult for mankind. Unless, of course, superiors are regarded as deity, in which case they are conceptually exempt from known laws of nature.

Again, nothing really new in what I just said. But I do think humans have an innate need to simultaneously be the biggest kid on
the block while also in need of superiors. There is a kind of quirky contradiction here.

 

[Goggs Mackay]

Do you guys find it interesting that many developed countries accept UFOs exist? I mean, that there are intelligently controlled flying craft that don't seem to be human-made. My own country the UK accepts the reality - it just reiterates that 'they pose no threat' or words to that effect.
There are plenty of documents from way back that show various organisations in the US think they exist and I don't mean UFO organisations!
I just come down on the evidence that UFOs, with the above definition, exist with a huge degree of certainty, likely over 95% confidence - the only question is what they actually are, who is in control and where they are from. I think debunkers are in the minority in thinking all UFOs are just misidentified mundane events.

Tyder I'm with you on the abduction thing. I find the Travis Walton case compelling and can see that type of thing happening. Too many of the reports of bedroom abductions and floating through walls etc I don't find credible, although really, the whole topic is so weird that you kinda have to allow for almost anything to be possible?

 

[Kim323]

It's all in the mind, even ultimately the ten best cases and leslie's cases (and I really do like her as a journalist and her take on it from that perspective, and reading those from the horse's mouth narratives in her book are truly titillating and goose-pimply, and the fact I'd love to take her to dinner if she's listening). But, yes, partially sad to say, but all in the mind. Someone linked to an Edgar Mitchell interview, but even his comments, though titillating and thought provoking, are pretty guarded and ambiguous. He makes some pretty intriguing claims in his interviews admittedly, but, really, about meeting with high officials, etc. I've mentioned more than once jung's flying saucers, a modern myth of things seen in the skies, just reread it recently to refresh, and his conclusions are quite clear, though Jung tends to dance around things, but that's his style and it's a style he purposely adopts in his writings to, ironically, make his points clear. And he was always rewriting his works as his thinking evolved, though this one of his later books. He's very clear it's all in our dreams, literally and figuratively.

And I've spoken before, yes ad nauseam sometimes(!), about the scientists who dominate the SETI search, and their conjectures about anthropomorphized intelligent extraterrestrials going through such a similar cultural, technical,biological,historical, scientific, etc evolution is well nigh impossible and says more about us than about them. Many scientists feel this way.

So, I'm afraid we are all alone, most probably. And even if not, that they'd be navigating our skies begs credulity to me. It's all in our brains, and nothing wrong with that. Kim

 

[Goggs Mackay]

Respectfully Kim, I'm not satisfied you are fully acquainted with all the hard evidence that exists - even if that evidence is of something that is not aliens in saucers, there is ample evidence that there are physical objects that can be filmed and more importantly, give radar returns - which means at the very least that when UFOs are visible on radar or film they are 'real' hard objects. There is no 'in the mind' to objects that accelerate faster than a modern jet fighter.

You cannot believe that all sightings are of weather balloons etc? There are sightings by many people of enormous craft. There is hundreds of hours of radar tapes/gun camera footage etc. Where in that evidence can there be room for 'all in the mind' explanation?

I totally accept that many 'UFO' sightings are indeed mistakes and things in the mind. But not all are. Kim, it only takes a single sighting to be real. I do not think the British Government would accept UFOs exist if it was easily provable that they do not exist.
The American military has in the past, usually secretly, documented an acceptance of the reality.

Of course Kim you may be arguing from the point that all the cases with radar returns are of mundane objects in the sky. I would be shocked if the cases involving chases by fighters hunting UFOs are all mistakes. There are cases with pilots giving running commentary with air traffic control, whilst they all are getting radar returns of the craft the pilot is following. If there are jet pilots willing to go on record with these things and not be 100% sure it was not mundane then maybe you have a point. There are way, way too many crazy people in positions of responsibility around the world Kim, if your assertion is factually correct. It is worrying that so many people of good standing risk their reputations and their careers with something in their minds. I don't know what UFOs are but I am pretty near positive they exist, not as mis-identified things.

Tell me your alternative explanation for the wealth of visual/radar/multiple winess cases? You have to explain something that resembles no known craft being followed by a aircraft, the pilot has many minutes in which to go over the other possibilities before being sure it is something unknown, he is reporting during the encounter he can see it with his eyes and his radar, ground control is aware of this and is also tracking on radar. The object can outrun the jet in any circumstance and is accelerating at g's that would crush a human instantly. Regardless of how fast any test aircraft is, and whatever it's top speed is, it will reach those speeds at modest accelerations. Reported UFOs routinely seem capable of physics-defying movements. And the comparison is being made by people who are intimately involved with the physics of flying and propulsion. Those who know better, who can see no way in science how certain things are achieved by UFOs but regardless, they still report that they saw things that go against what they know to be rules!


Again Kim, with respect, you are capable of debunking anything on a case by case basis, but until you can do just that, the 'all in the mind' explanation does a disservice to so many competent people who trust their equipment and eyes. You need to explain these cases before you can make such a sweeping assertion.

I am concerned that you fall into the camp of 'It can't be true therefore it is not true'. Does that sum up your core beliefs or are you entertaining the possibility but coming down on the side of 'probably not' rather than 'it cannot be.' ?

I accept I may be being unfair to you and you do indeed have your own take on all sides of the phenomena - I just felt it was too much of a soundbite with no real reasoning behind it all. I am willing to be educated otherwise of course.
I get taken to task myself in this very forum, regularly so I don't want you to think anything other than me asking you to explain yourself a lot more fully rather than make a statement that is too broad a brush for anyone reasoning their way through all the facets of ufology!

 

[Kim323]

Hi, goggs, and no disrespect taken at all. I used to enjoy the sensation or feeling that UFOs were extraterrestrial craft, but on every level I just don't believe that it is remotely possible. I will admit there's an inherent element of what you term it can't be true so it isn't, as you put it. But I think my reasons point to a cannot be conclusion. Just off the top of my head as thoughts occur, taking away some of their coherence.
1. I've read a lot about individual cases, and am far from impressed. Rendlesham, Roswell, shag harbor, the Japan airlines case, Kenneth Arnold, Phoenix lights, these are supposedly some of the best cases, but I think hysteria, psychological factors, fatigue, instrument phenomena, astronomical stuff, weather, illusion, atmospheric reflection, practical joking, hoaxing, attention seeking, excuses for some perceived flub-up,and I could think of more, in other words the nature of our environment mixed with our senses. I forget the name of it, but that case where a military crew over the gulf states in their plane tracked something in the fifties, I think can be explained. I don't claim I could do it, but a prosaic/mundane reason is behind the tiny percentage not explained.
2. I know it's said, well, if only two percent of sightings are unexplained, that would amount to thousands in real numbers because of the huge number of reported sightings, but that is faulty in my opinion and begs the question.
3. No real peer reviewed scientific studies except by a man I do respect, Peter sturrock, but even he said it was very inconclusive, and part of his research was polling others who did claim to have seen stuff, but nothing remotely conclusive.
4. Aside from the so called best cases, others I think are absurd are summoned to show the existence of intelligently controlled craft. I think Roswell is one of these, the Travis Walton case, betty and Barney hill, and I could thick of others. Not to disparage a no doubt horrifying experience, but to me to even remotely entertain intelligent extraterrestrials abducting humans strains my credulity. And a crash of a craft, my heavens, all of new Mexico would have been put under martial law, or all heck would have broken loose in the population if something alien had crashed.
5. I think something can be measured by its actual impact and results. Except on an individual basis for the experiencers of abduction and UFOs, there has actually been very, very little societal, cultural, religious (dare I say that word) impact. Or militarily. There's nothing like any smoking guns, despite everyone right down to south American air forces conducting investigations, it seems like every western nation's government. I think if conclusive hard radar evidence, film, existed, that would indeed galvanize the planet to unite at least on some level militarily. Military cooperation is not unheard of among humans, even if today's friend is the enemy tomorrow. Humans are good at that, to our own dismay. And yes, religiously, culturally, there would be whole movements begun. Instead there's heaven's gate and what's that French one, the raelians. Petty stuff, and indicative to me of UFOs being a cultural "thing" of no real duration in terms of longevity or of consequence in terms of numbers.
6. The release of all this formerly classified material by governments, to the extent that the American government is lambasted for tardiness, has given no remotely convincing information.
7. Unlike Stanton, and I like the guy, the american press would have been on this alleged coverup like heck. And heck again, the uk daily mail would have sniffed it out for sure. It sure got Hugh grant riled up! What a newspaper, gotta admire some things about it. That this could have been kept secret is ludicrous to me.
8. The Phoenix lights: for as long as whatever it was, and for how many was it thousands of witnesses, and for the breakdown subsequently as to no, at first it was flares, or was that the second stage, my heavens there would have been mass something if not hysteria if actual craft had been seen, and there would have been jet fighters screaming through the skies, and there was barely any reaction militarily or culturally, or mass protests that it be explained.
9. Instead we have mufon and cufos and other organizations that are known for their pretty dismal effect, not to disparage the very real and laudable intentions of their efforts.
10. The whole phenomenon, as I said in my previous post on this thread and in others, there is just too much, in fact it's nearly solely the case, anthropomorphizing of these intelligent extraterrestrials.
11. Instead, in my view, we DO have ourselves, we do know us, for good and bad. I do believe, based on rational peer reviewed research, that certain phenomena have occurred on our planet, religiously, technologically, scientifically, culturally, evolutionary, and on and on that stand the tests of science and observation. Instead, we in my opinion project ourselves outward and assume for whatever reason that all these characteristics of us and our evolution in these spheres has gone on in a similar fashion for intelligent life on other planets. Therefore, they just must exist with this high level of certainty, they would certainly understand the molecular structure of this and that compound, they would certainly need science, would go through cultural growth too, would have conquered this or that method of propulsion, and on and on. Many scientists do not take these things as givens by any means.
12. None of this is really directed at you per se, goggs. Just my feelings on the subject. Kim

 

[Bob Watson]

the object i saw was real it was not a light or a flare it as a silent black triangle that flew west to east. it had all three dimentions. the craft matched no know configureations for aircraft.the craft made no noise at all. several other ppl saw the craft including my wife and my father in law. this did not exist in my mind. it was real it was there and NO ONE can tell me otherwise.Sooo if what did I see then? how is it that myself my wife and a man who has NO REASON to lie all say they saw the SAME THING?
here is a vid of an craft that matched the one I saw but the one I saw was closer and lower.

 

[Goggs Mackay]

Well Kim, as always, I appreciate you taking the time to explain yourself a bit more. There are a few points on which I would definitely take issue but I won't bother because we both know where we stand on the issue. I may add that I have never seen a UFO myself but the very fact my own military and government does not deny what otherwise should be seen as 'something quite silly' is most intriguing to me.
I am wondering if as you say, there may be a bit of 'can't be true so it isn't true' and it looks like that partly may be based on your dislike of all theories revolving around ET's. What if UFOs are nothing to do with ETs of any description? Do you give any percentage to other explanations that are not mundane? (Thanks for the Peter Hoone recommend but I wasn't home that night anyway!)

 

[Kim323]

Vesvehighfolk, your sighting is indeed intriguing, and don't think I discount it because I don't think there is much possibility of intelligent extraterrestrials! No doubt you saw something for sure, and it doesn't mean your senses let you down, or that you were "seeing things that weren't there". It was there, and doing as you describe, no doubt!

Goggs, I think some of my viewpoint comes from two books I read a good while ago. I dug them out:

Rare Earth: Why Complex Life Is Uncommon in the Universe, by two scientists, Peter Ward and Donald Brownlee

If the Universe is Teeming with Aliens Where is Everybody? By Stephen Webb. The title is a play on Fermi's famous saying.

I do think we are all alone regarding intelligent extraterrestrials.

The only remote thing that makes me think that it's a possibility, and of course I don't know for sure, of course not, and that evolution of life elsewhere just may have exhibited similarities to evolution on our planet is that thing in evolution that DOES ASTOUND ME the most. It's called convergence, where very different species have evolved similar structures that fulfill the same/near same purpose. For instance, eyes for sight, though of course there are insect eyes and our eyes, and more types of eyes that sense different kinds of sight. As a hobbyist beekeeper since boyhood, I know that special feeling of love I feel for one of my beloved honeybees as she eyes me not malignantly at all, they are such gentle insects, but some of my girls do stand in groups on top of the frames when I've got the cover of the hive off and we do gaze at each other eyeball to compound eyes. Of course, you, goggs, are more normal than that, and get a similar feeling from your dog!

Then there's flying structures and structures for walking and grasping that have evolved independently among life on our planet.

Also, I guess there is a basic aversion in me to contemplating intelligent extraterrestrials that do some of the stuff they are purported to do in sightings, cruel actions, just silly actions you'd think they'd be above. Also, and I know this sound absurd, why would a craft from another planet have BLINKING, FLASHING LIGHTS, land on a tripod, or HAVE WINDOWS? Or shoot beams of light. It's just as if we anthropomorphize their vehicles, too.

I won't lie and say I wouldn't like to meet some, benevolent ones, but even there I'm anthropomorphizing them.

As for other explanations for the sightings, if we assume for the sake of the point that these are intelligently controlled craft, no, I would believe even less that they are us from the future or are interdimensional beings. I know I sound contradictory, but I do believe in inter dimensional beings, to employ that term.

Like the Maytag repairman, it does get awfully lonely, out there in the universe. But you probably didn't have that advertisement in the UK! Kim

 

[mike]

If the Twinning Memo is real

ATTENTION: Brig. General George Schulgen
AC/AS-2
1. As requested by AC/AS-2 there is presented below the considered opinion of this command concerning the so-called "Flying Discs." This opinion is based on interrogation report data furnished by AC/AS-2 and preliminary studies by personnel of T-2 and Aircraft Laboratory, Engineering Division T-3. This opinion was arrived at in a conference between personnel from the Air Institute of Technology, Intelligence T-2, Office, Chief of Engineering Division, and the Aircraft, Power Plant and Propeller Laboratories of Engineering Division T-3.
2. It is the opinion that:

a. The phenomenon is something real and not visionary or fictitious​

​

​

The Twining Memo​

Richard Dolan - 12 Government Documents that Take UFOs Seriously