Ustwo

I like you. You are the first 'pro' UFO person I've seen write who wasn't a wack job about it which makes this a fun debate. Normally its like arguing with someone who believes in faith healing.

I do think in the 40’s and 50’s the government did use UFO’s as a cover for projects, it makes sense to do so, and with all the jet, rocket, nuclear tests and the emerging cold war this made sense. I think the problem was no one relized just how far people would go with those cover stories and the ‘cult’ of UFOlogy that would follow. I wouldn’t be shocked if this was still policy today if some new ‘super secret’ aircraft was compromised. Logically it makes sense as the UFO enthusiasts can think what they want, it doesn’t really affect anything, and it would keep the sighting lost in a sea of hoaxes and the like.

Now I don’t think this actually matters to the concept of alien ‘visitors’. After all the government could very well use UFO’s as a cover story and at the same time their could be real alien space ships, one does not eliminate the other.

My belief, and it is a belief, I can’t say I have proof, but I do think I have probability on my side, is that we have not been visited.

Its possible that some technologically superior alien species has been monitoring earth for scientific or nefarious reasons, but obviously so subtlety that they leave no real proof. So while possible, its no different than the tooth fairy in that I can’t really do anything to test it and it can be safely ignored unless something new emerges.

Then we have the crashed spaceship mythos. This again is also possible, but I’d have to say that safely traveling 100 light years only to crash doing something as mundane as a planetary landing would be almost comical. Now maybe this has happened but I think its sort of difficult to see how it could be covered up so well for so long. Government secrets seem a dime a dozen these days, and its been that way for a while. I would expect that there would be SOME physical evidence which could be produced, not just a guy claiming to have a PhD in physics who later turned out to be the night janitor who was fired for sleeping on the job in 1978 (and I’m just making that up, but I do recall one guy who wrote a book etc who turned out to be something very similar, I just don’t recall the details). I’d also add that some very smart people can believe some very crazy things, so even a legitimate person can be out in left field on these stories. I personally have a friend who is very intelligent, who I really like and is really a great guy. As a student he discovered a hazard in a piece of equipment which a governing body attempted to ‘repress’ his disclosing and to fudge the data to make it look less harmful. This was a real conspiracy, (though it was mild, I won’t get into details) and the problem WAS fixed but only after enough time was bought for damage control, and this time may have been bought with a large donation to said body. The problem for him is that since then he sees every conspiracy theory out there as valid. So everything from vaccines, to milk, to fluoride, to dental amalgam, to about everything in the government must be a conspiracy. I’ve never asked him about UFO’s, but I can already tell you his answer. I think its almost a form of shock, as he was so affected by what he experienced that he never really ‘recovered’. So while I’d love to believe some of these ‘confessions’, until something solid comes out of it, I have to say its possible but not probable.

I won’t even get to the alien abduction stories, and I doubt you give those any credibility either. I myself used to have a recurring nightmare as a child that was almost identical to the abduction dreams so I always get a kick out of the stories.

So I won’t say there is no possibility. Maybe FTL travel is not only possible but mundane, and some day someone will say ‘duh, how did we not see that!’ and the next thing you know we are zipping around the galaxy. Maybe there is a vast and benign galactic government who is waiting for us to ‘mature’ to a point where we can join the party, or maybe we are being secretly monitored by a reptiloid alien race who wants to turn us into meat snacks and have alien love children with us, but to me any real proof, any real technology would be just to ‘big’ to repress.

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Agents of the enemies who hold office in our own government, who attempt to eliminate our "freedoms" and our "right to know" are posting among us, I fear.....on this very forum. - host

Obama - Know a Man by the friends he keeps.

Slims

I am a big fan of the romance of conspiracy theories. I also believe that people are absolutely capable of doing horrible things and then trying to cover them up.

However, I also am a big fan of occams razor. If you want to convince me that we are being (secretly) visited by aliens, who only show themselves to members of the US government who happen to be part of a huge conspiracy, that happens to be the only institution in the world with no leaks or accidental admissions, then give me a good reason why the simpler explanation is incorrect: That aliens are figments of someones overactive imagination.

Funny how people always "see" aliens/ufo's that somehow perfectly match the science fiction/cult idea of what an alien should look like. After war of the worlds the flying saucer was in. Now it is little men with big eyes. How charmingly anthropomorphic.

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"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill

"All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence

Johnny Rotten

Hehe, thanks. I try to stay level-headed and even-minded about the whole deal.

The story goes that Roswell was blanketed with high-powered radar. The most powerful network in the world at the time, in fact, because it was the location of the world's only nuclear stockpile. The radar interfered with the aliens' guidance systems and caused them to crash. I agree that the chances are still pretty marginal. In order for it to be probable, you have to assume a large volume of traffic in the first place -- the kind of volume that would be obvious to a casual stargazer. But we don't see that, unless these craft are largely operating in stealth.

As far as secrecy, the indication I get, mostly from the Disclosure Project testimony, is that fear, intimidation and ridicule can be used very effectively as leverage to keep people quiet. One of the witnesses talks about a form he can fill out to report a sighting, and 48 of the 50 pages is a psychological profile. Everything about you, your family, your parents, siblings, et cetera -- so that something (in his opinion) can be found that will undermine your credibility. With the military, we're also dealing with people who are loyal to their country and want to protect it. If they're told that staying quiet is the best thing for America, that's what they'll generally do.

Aside from Betty and Barney Hill, none of it really grabs me. Regressive hypnosis is pretty shaky. I've read too many stories of it being used in court and turning out to be completely false -- but the accuser fervently believed that all these crimes against them had actually been committed. It's scary. I think the majority of the phenomenon can be chalked up to mental illness, with attention-seeking being a close second. And sometimes both seem to be involved. Do I believe no one has ever been taken by ET against their will? I honestly have no idea. Even if they made a stop on the White House lawn tomorrow and proved their existence to the world, I think it would still be an open question until they themselves said otherwise.

Yeah, I think it's important to keep in mind the historical significance of the popular morphology. It seemed to actually come from pulp sci-fi movies of the 50s before it became the staple of abduction stories and Roswell claims.

On the other hand, Stan Deyo claims that Forbidden Planet is largely authentic -- that the technology featured in the film actually exists. Is it too much to extrapolate to other films and surmise that the Little Green Men aren't that far from the truth? I don't know. But that's the way I think about the whole phenomenon. I try to tie things together and see if the knot holds when I pull.

According to consensus UFO mythology, they've actually crash landed all over the world, for decades. Commonly due to mechanical failure, but sometimes due to governments testing out plasma cannons and the like. Now, I don't put much stock in Philip J. Corso's claims -- that lasers, fiber optics, kevlar and the like are based on technology retrieved from Roswell -- but I detect a kernel of truth. I keep in mind that Corso was an information officer, first and foremost. Not a scientist or someone who would be a liaison between scientists. I think he's a deflector, in fact, but that's probably another topic there. Suffice to say that the tech he claims to have ushered in was in development for decades, with no spikes that would chronologically corroborate with his claims.

There have been leaks, or purported leaks, like the Majestic/Majic 12 documents, the Cutler-Twining Memo, and a couple deathbed affidavits generally corroborating the Roswell crash. And several authorities over the decades have gone on record with statements that strongly indicate an alien presence. Of course, there's a degree of subjectivity with that last element. Statements aren't evidence anyway, although they can lead in the direction of evidence.

The problem is that the statements are uniformly downplayed, and the documents attacked. Arguments sometimes devolve to typographical deviation of timestamps on the onionskin.

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"The idea that money doesn't buy you happiness is a lie put about by the rich, to stop the poor from killing them." -- Michael Caine

Ourcrazymodern?

Tic...we have always been here and want you because you are us. Are you not?

What are we afraid of?

Our imaginations...

...will consistently lead us to where we don't necessarily want to go.

"god" willing, we'll get there anyways.

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BE JUST AND FEAR NOT

DaveOrion

OCM, You are the king of the one liners, and the 2 or 3 liners, but I would like to see you expand on your thoughts a little more. Your status as king will not be diminished in any way I assure you. God willing, I'll get to read a bit more....

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Syriana...have you ever tried liquid MDMA?....Liquid MDMA? No....Arash, when you wanna do this?.....After prayer...

Ourcrazymodern?

Come with me, then.

Our extra-terrestrial status resides in our imaginations and will not be falsified by facts.

I love you, DaveMatrix!

The future we'll have is what we'll make, and our alien comrades are unwilling, which is not to say unable, to drag us there.

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BE JUST AND FEAR NOT