Roswell

[michael]

I've been away from the show and the forums for quite awhile, but am back and trying to catch up. My question to everyone is about the Roswell crash. What's the current thought about what happened. I've been through Stanton's book Crash at Corona a few times and it makes a very strong case for at least two crashed objects in New Mexico. However, after listening to several recent episodes of the podcast, I'm getting the impression that the current theory is that there were no crashes of actual machines and that the UFO phenomenon might not involve actual spacecraft.

The reason I'm asking is that, if the testimony of the witnesses is to be believed, then it's a HUGE story that most Americans don't seem to care about.

What are your thoughts, not only on the Roswell incident, but on the current state of ufology now. Are we dealing with flying machines or something more supernatural?

 

[fitzbew88]

What are your thoughts, not only on the Roswell incident, but on the current state of ufology now. Are we dealing with flying machines or something more supernatural?

Roswell: Something funny happened. I find it implausible that the military officers involved mistook Mogul for a "flying saucer". Yet, if it was something more bizarre, what happened to it? Even years later, high-ranking government officials were as perplexed by the UFO phenomenon as ever. If they had retrieved debris, it's implausible to me that they could not know about it. Even in 1952, they were still trying to figure out what the phenomenon represented -- or whether it was even real.

Current state of ufology: No different than 1947. Lots and lots of stories of bizarre objects in the sky accompanied by conjecture.

Flying machines or something more supernatural?: Well, super duper advanced flying machines might seem to be supernatural, not sure I'd draw a difference.

 

[Aaron LeClair]

Roswell is inconclusive to me. If it is mogul, there's no documents proving it to my knowledge. I'm open to the eth, but not convinced.

State of ufology is the same as it's been. Lots of kooks, some good cases. Media is incompetent in dealing with it, and so is mainstream scientist.

I'm happy more people have cams these days though.

 

[Frootloop]

My own personal thoughts on the Roswell story is that something did occur there, there is too much witness testimony to suggest otherwise. I believe that the debris field was just part of the story, with the main crash being at another location closeby. I dont for one second believe the "Mogul" explaination due to the witness statements and the size of the debris field. The initial press release of a "flying disc" then an 'oh sorry, it was actually a baloon' explaination did nothing for the army's credibility either.

Something has been swept under the rug at Roswell and time is running out to discover what it was. Witnesses are dissapearing fast and their accounts of the incident are going with them. The only real hope of further disclosure from the witnesses are affidavits released after their passing, which are generally treated with great scepticism and are ridiculed by the general public.

It sounds like Roswell itself has become a tourist attraction for the curious with the events surrounding the town treated by most as nothing more than "science fiction". Im sure that Rowsell relies heaviliy on its tourist trade, and why not if it brings the money in.

Its easy to become disillusioned with the UFO scene as a whole thanks to air force etc reports citing nothing more than flares or mass hallucination, the placement of reports into the genre of "entertainment" and the constant battle against hoaxes.

On the up-side, i believe that there is greater public awareness to the situation and most people now believe that we are not alone in this universe and are willing to entertain the idea of alien visitation. Popular science is theorising the existance of parallel dimensions and proving the existance of planets outside our own solar system. I personally think that the whole story is FAR deeper than "Just UFO's" and that this mystery is only now starting to unfold..... we just have to be a bit more patient I guess.

 

[Michael L.]

Wait a minute, let us say for the sake of argument that we have recovered several crashes over the years. Maybe they were at war and shooting each other down so we got equipment, bodies, material from different cultures. Even though we have had it for like 60 years, we may have made very little head way on it. Think about it... think about how many artifacts we have of human cultures that we just aren't sure about... how many things we can't figure out quite how they were made or used... how many languages we still can't quite read. And that is all human culture.

Now, I travel back two hundred years or so and show up at my ancestors' tipi. They don't speak English, but they understand that my iPod sings. They may even recognize some of the music. But a week after I am gone and the iPod hasn't been synced in a while, they are done. They can have it another hundred years and not be able to figure out how it works. Even once they learn to read some English, the symbols on it (like the two lines for pause) will still be a mystery. As will how to power it and how to interface with it because they are lacking so much in support equipment (like my iMac) as well as knowledge.

Now, travel back 1,000 years and give their ancestors a F-16 and tell them that it can fly. Even with 500 years to poke at it, I don't the First Nations will be meeting Columbus (or the Vikings) with an Air Force!

That is the situation we are in if we have a UFO. Except that it also may be damaged beyond repair even for the makers!

So after a few years, even if people are quietly working on it, is it something that becomes the most pressing thing to explain to the next generation of military leaders? "We have a UFO, but can't figure it out." may start to get overshadowed by Korea, Cuba, VietNam, budgets, gays in your army, 9/11...

So, 60 years after Roswell and still pretty much clueless.

 

[Frootloop]

Now, I travel back two hundred years or so and show up at my ancestors' tipi. They don't speak English, but they understand that my iPod sings. They may even recognize some of the music. But a week after I am gone and the iPod hasn't been synced in a while, they are done. They can have it another hundred years and not be able to figure out how it works. Even once they learn to read some English, the symbols on it (like the two lines for pause) will still be a mystery. As will how to power it and how to interface with it because they are lacking so much in support equipment (like my iMac) as well as knowledge.

I understand what you are saying, but what if you went back even further and indicated to the people that you find that you would stay with them for a given amount of time to show them how the iPod works, and how to power it.... You dont give everything away, but just enough so that they can use the technology. Maybe you ask them for something in return, something that doesnt mean much to them....perhaps a strand of hair from each member of their tribe? maybe a colony of bees, what good is that to you?

Your ancestor would treat you like a magician, a warlock or perhaps even a deity? you have not only given him the technology but also the knowledge of how to power and use it...... This knowledge would set these people apart from others who do not have access to this "object" and the magic it performs. Perhaps these people would become very protective of this technology and deny to the other tribes that they even have the power of the "shiny, singing tablet"..... and if they do find out about you, perhaps they would fear you? maybe even seek to destroy you? The iPod will eventually fail and become nothing more than myth and legend but at least some of the information you gave them will live on perhaps in the form of a religion, maybe the iPod wont survive, but maybe someone will write about you and the miracles you perform in a book?.

Incidentally, have we not actually seen great technological advances over the past few decades? When did the major advances begin in electronics?

 

[Michael L.]

Well, that is a different scenario. I am kind of taking the stance that Roswell yielded a banged-up used space ship and a couple of corpses. If you believe that there is actual communication between the government and aliens then my thoughts really don't apply.

My ancestors would treat me like a magician, though, because I am a magician!

Seriously, though, I am not sure we have gotten many huge direct technological advances from UFOs. Up until last year, I worked as a professional audio technician. In this field I worked with both vacuum tubes and solid state electronics, including pure digital amplifiers. I worked for a large company doing the artist relations work and repairing the antique equipment that came in. As such, I am one of the few people under 50 who is pretty familiar with the older solid state circuitry from the inside (I say that because in school tubes and older styles of solid state circuits are not really covered much in schools anymore; I was told when I was in an engineering program around 2000 that I would probably never work on anything with vacuum tubes except for picture tubes)... I spent a great deal of time trying to scrounge up old chips that were as old as I am and developing plug in modules that allow modern op-amps to plug into older designs. I really see a consistent and logical progression of technology as the manufacturing techniques improved. Our race to get to the moon was probably the biggest boon to technological advancement (and it road the wave of World War II innovation) and it is kind of petering out... that's why I want to get to Mars before the Chinese! Let's keep everyone eating our dust! Anyway...

Even if we could figure out what certain items did and how they worked, the manufacturing would probably be quite beyond our capabilities. If anything, the recovered technology would probably be a source of inspiration for design and something to emulate. If we could give the Tokugawa Shogunate a couple of M-16's, even though they would recognize them as guns and even easily figure out how to use them, I am not sure that they would be able to replicate them. They would also recognize the weapon from a Phalanx missile defense system (which I believe is what Jesse Ventura carried in the movie Predator) as an incredible improvement on their own familiar arquebus but I doubt they could come close to replicating it!

But if you think that we have been fed technology by outside forces you would think things would be a bit different, yeah...

 

[Frootloop]

But if you think that we have been fed technology by outside forces you would think things would be a bit different, yeah...

Unless the powers that have recovered those artifacts have kept them to themselves..... in which case, we wouldnt hear about them. unless of course we were drip fed information from sympathetic government insiders or scientists who had worked on the artifacts had come forward and released their findings into the general population....

But there lies the problem, who to believe..... If an apparent ex-governmental scientist comes forward with information so outstanding and so unbelievable, do you trust them? Is it a hoax or disinformation? are they a crackpot? or is it just possible that they are telling the truth? The only way to guage this is "credibility", and how do you even begin to ascertain that on a subject that is based solely upon witness reports, blury images and conjecture.

 

[Michael L.]

Let me clarify: I mean "if you think that humans have been given working technology by an outside force that produced it..."