What is the point in showing people evidence of UFOs

[BlackWidower]

Well, people are not willing to believe. Sometimes because of church, sometimes because of reasoning "Hey, the govenrment would tell us about that, wouldn't it?" (where the answer is: no, it wouldn't. Such statement would cause worldwide panic / rush / some crazy shit / even the churches would have hard time because of that.)
Also, the media want us not to believe in 'extraterrestials' making fun of them, explaining how you can edit the video to make a "UFO above earth recording", and showing us government workers trying to explain, that "hell, we would tell you about that if there were proofs of extraterrestial vehicles here, on Earth - wouldn't we?".

See, that's something I don't buy. Why the hell would people panic because we made peaceful contact with extraterrestrial species?

"OH MY GOD! THERE ARE ALIENS OUT THERE AND THEY'RE NICE! RUUUUUUN!!! RUN FROM THE NICE ALIENS!!!!"

It might mean crises of faith by all devotees of the various religions. But I think that would do them some good.

Give humanity some credit man.

 

[maxben]

To start I believe that Aliens exist and have been visiting Earth for at least 6000 years. Not important to this discussion but that is what i believe.

I was thinking today, why tell anyone you saw a UFO or that you were abducted by aliens. I mean other than a few people who seriously research extraterrestrials, few would believe you. Even this a video of the alien abducting you, bringing you back, and saying (in alien language) 'thank you for helping with our science', and a shirt stained with alien blood as you tried to fight the effects of the parallelizing ray in the spaceship; someone on youtube will still say it is that it is made up and anyone can synthesize alien blood using gelatin, black food coloring, and human blood and no lab will certify the results because then, they think, they will be discredited and lose their jobs.

So what do you think, is it still worth the pursuit of knowledge even knowing that no one will believe you (at least for the foreseeable future)?

But here is the problem, you BELIEVE they exist so every piece of questionable "evidence" you have merely reinforces your pre-existing belief and makes you confused about why other people "just don't see it".
I would only listen to proof about extraordinary things from people who don't believe in it and have no pre-existing emotional connections to such a belief. That, or experiencing it for myself.

But I believe because I saw something that I can not explain. No I am not going into it here because I do not feel like being called a lier tonight. So by your definition of credible sources if I convinced you that UFOs visit Earth then you are no longer a credible witness or if I showed my evidence to a skeptic and they now believe then you would not believe them either, because they believe.

I'm not calling you a liar, but its very common to fill in the blanks when you don't know.
For example, a scientist is rarely sure of what he has observed but he must accept that something is the way it is because his tests have shown its the case over and over again. A single experience that you had with something you cannot explain proves nothing. And I say this as someone who once believed in ghosts for the same reason as I think you believe in aliens (though aliens are a tonne more likely than ghosts). If you showed it to the scientifically inclined skeptic, the skeptic is not likely to believe you after a single piece of evidence, but if it convinces him enough to pursue it legitimately (not as a joke Discovery Channel special) than we can say your evidence may have merit because you have convinced someone with more expertise than you to look into it.

Btw, have you heard of the new Theory as to why aliens haven't visited Earth though they probably exist? Apparently, according to new calculations and stargazing methods, Earth doesn't look like a planet with life on it. We are way too-small as compared to the Superearths that populate a lot of space with higher the size and density, and in fact we can see that Earth is not a good place for life by the many high-level extinction events that have occurred. Superearths also have an issue with a tougher atmosphere and gravity to escape from so they need to be on a much higher technological base than us to escape their worlds and begin exploring space. Just some interesting trivia

No, I had not heard that. I call it pure speculation manly because we have not yet found any 'superearths' and we have not (officially) interviewed ET to determine why. I like my pure speculation that their mission is mostly scientific.
But the 'superearth' theory is interesting.

Actually, we've found many of them.
The smallest Earth-like planet we've found is 1.9 Earth masses or higher (they can judge minimum and maximum sizes, not perfect).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super-Earth

And here is the Theory paper:
Earth: A Borderline Planet for Life?
http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/news/2008/pr200802.html

Uh...do you read what you cite?

The term super-Earth refers only to the mass of the planet, and does not imply anything about the surface conditions or habitability. An alternative term "Gas Dwarf" may be more accurate for some examples, especially higher mass ones as suggested by MIT professor Sara Seager. Alternatively, Super-Venus or Super-Pluto might be used for super-hot or cold rocky exoplanets to give a less potentially misleading label.

That's from the wikipedia article you cited. Are you sure this has anything to do with alien life?

That's because of the method they use to find them, you can't be sure of their habitability (as planets are not bright like stars, they have to try to use the reflection from the light of stars to see the general shape of the planet).
However, it is the second link that is of more interest.
After scientists ran models, it appears that this could be the sweet-spot for habitable planets.
Also, some of those found appear to have liquid water (again according to models based on readings).
Other scientists have claimed that such a high density would inhibit plate tectonics.
Its a new thing so I'm not putting too much faith in this theory (they will have to argue this for at least 20 years before we even get close to a scientific consensus on the matter).
I mean, when we first saw the sun we thought it was a magical chariot that's flown by a god everyday in perpetuity.
I put it up there because I thought it was interesting, our earth-centric ego makes us think that alien-life must be humanoid in some way and habitable planets must be Earth-like, but it might be that our Earth is really bad at holding species. It also adds to the mystery of possible intelligent life from before humanity (for example, reading about the Homo Erectus is fascinating) that died off do to Earth's inhospitably and extinction events.

The reason I bring it up is because while I think to claim that aliens have been to Earth without us having clear proof of them is an extraordinary claim, the claim that there are no aliens in the whole of space is just as ridiculous as proven by the fact that WE are here.
As such, we must come up with theories that explain how it could be that there is alien life that has not visited Earth. This is known as the Fermi Paradox which I'm sure you know at least a little about.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox
Here are the various answers:
# 5 Explaining the paradox theoretically

* 5.1 Few, if any, other civilizations currently exist
o 5.1.1 No other civilizations have arisen
o 5.1.2 It is the nature of intelligent life to destroy itself
o 5.1.3 It is the nature of intelligent life to destroy others
o 5.1.4 Life is periodically destroyed by naturally occurring events
o 5.1.5 Human beings were created alone
o 5.1.6 Metazoan lifeforms, having developed sentience, find it difficult to reproduce in micro gravity
* 5.2 They do exist, but we see no evidence
o 5.2.1 Communication is impossible due to problems of scale
+ 5.2.1.1 Intelligent civilizations are too far apart in space or time
+ 5.2.1.2 It is too expensive to spread physically throughout the galaxy
+ 5.2.1.3 Human beings have not been searching long enough
o 5.2.2 Communication is impossible for technical reasons
+ 5.2.2.1 Human beings are not listening properly
+ 5.2.2.2 Civilizations only broadcast detectable radio signals for a brief period of time
+ 5.2.2.3 The vast distances involved make detecting signals unlikely
+ 5.2.2.4 They tend to experience a technological singularity
+ 5.2.2.5 We are the first to have radio technology
o 5.2.3 They choose not to interact with us
+ 5.2.3.1 It is the nature of intelligent life to keep silent
+ 5.2.3.2 Earth is purposely isolated (The zoo hypothesis)
+ 5.2.3.3 It is dangerous to communicate
+ 5.2.3.4 They are too alien
+ 5.2.3.5 They are non-technological
o 5.2.4 They are here unobserved

These three are my favourite:
o 5.1.2 It is the nature of intelligent life to destroy itself
o 5.1.3 It is the nature of intelligent life to destroy others
o 5.1.4 Life is periodically destroyed by naturally occurring events

It would just seem odd that not a single alien species would make itself obviously known. After 6000 years(using your timeline) they know and understand us so they CAN communicate, while at the same time their technology is so much better that I doubt we can be any threat to them, while at the same time we are so primitive that we can be of no use to them whatsoever, while at the same time we are destroying our planet so if they want our resources they need to get it now.

 

[BiscuitTrouser]

SNIP?

Im not too sure what your trying to say here, do you think people want to surpress the fact aliens "exist" or that they dont want to believe? Im sorry but there isnt any concrete evidence for aliens as of yet, "spaceships" have been dots in the sky and little white blurs. I agree that if the scenario you described happened i would believe you all the way but somehow in 600 years it hasnt happened. Once. Ever. No evidence has been brought back of a concrete nature. No technology, no anything. Also i hate these aliens you speak of already, they spent 6000 years probing our asses? WHAT THE HELL DO THEY EXPECT TO FIND UP THERE! I think if aliens did come to out planet then their technology would have to be so advanced (at least light speed travel to hail from the nearest star) that any attention we would merit wouldnt be anything above the other animals on earth. We would be so staggeringly out teched there wouldnt be much point being secretive. Satalites have never found any pictures, ive never seen a real photo/movie as extensive as you describe or any example technology. It just seems too far fetched for aliens to want to spy on us for SIX THOUSAND YEARS. Despite being obviously god like beings in comparison to us to even GET HERE.

It just seems like a massive cover up for other peoples lies that they say:

"Aliens are real!"
"Where are they?"
"They hide from us and only abduct idiot rednecks/attention whores or people of an unsound mental condition."
"erm ok... why?"
"Dunno its aliens"

 

[PurePareidolia]

I consider myself a skeptic and definitely believe extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. That said, I consider it likely that aliens exist, though I have no evidence to support that notion and certainly don't believe they've been visiting us. My attitude on most "sightings" tends to be "if it's a UFO, you don't know what it is by definition and there's a million more likely things it could be than an alien space craft, and a billion things more likely than an alien space craft resembling an existing cultural ideal of an alien space craft".

The reason people like David Icke are considered crazy is because they make extraordinary claims constantly and produce little to no evidence supporting them, then that which they do present is easily discredited upon cursory examination.
If on the other hand you get said extraordinary evidence, particularly a blood sample but anything tangible, I won't call you crazy. I'll be ecstatic, I would LOVE to see proof of alien life forms within my lifetime, that would just be incredibly cool beyond belief.

Now, the reason the History channel is not considered a credible source is because shows like those portray shoddy evidence, poor research and conjecture in the place of facts, but the channel shows them anyway. Hence it can't be trusted to screen shows for factual content, making it a non-credible source.

Finally, a hardcore skeptic won't immediately dismiss a video as fake. They'll more likely study it, attempt to determine it's veracity and ask for more evidence if they have any doubts. A skeptic is not a denier or a naysayer, a skeptic is one who requires a high standard of evidence. If you had an alien space ship in your back yard, we would expect huge amounts of evidence. Myself I'd immediately grab a camera, start taking pictures and videos and not stop until I had it documented form every angle, distance, lighting condition and so on or until I ran out of disk space, whichever came first.
If on the other hand I only got it from a distance, I'd still try filming it as long as I could. What most skeptics ask for is not an unreasonable standard of evidence, it's just that nobody's yet met that standard.

 

[Okuu_Fusion]

Its far-fetched to think that aliens are visiting earth. Maybe in the past... But anything that happens nowadays are probably not aliens but technology left behind in order to study us... the aliens people see today are probably an artificial intelligence...

 

[Cheshire Cat]

Personally I fully support the fact that non-terrestrial life exists considering how big the universe is, but I don't think they have dropped by and visited us at any time

 

[Virus0015]

why wouldn't they make themselves known?

Why would they want to make themselves known?

Questions such as these don't work. We have no basis at all on which to presume the attributes of extraterrestrial life.

Back to the OP, it would not be so difficult if people accepted that there was a probability of alien life. Personally, since the universe is seemingly very large, I think it would be a bit stupid to definitively say that Earth is the only inhabited planet. Typically the nay-sayers I come across are mildly religious, which I find a bit strange because their beliefs are placed in something that has yet to be proven.

 

[Adeptus_Astartes]

Nobody doubts that UFOs exist, no evidence is necessary there. UFOs are everywhere, seen by millions every day, although they usually don't stay unidentified for long. Weather, planes, birds, but no Superman.

As for the so-called "aliens" that are supposedly visiting (or not visiting) Earth (or not Earth), Occam's Razor applies here more than anywhere else. Do not create unnecessary entities. If the aliens are real, good for them. If they are not real, good for us, I guess. Either way, all the cards are in their hypothetical hands and unless they choose to actually do something, their alleged presence (or lack thereof) here (or elsewhere) is absolutely irrelevant.

The simplest explanation is most likely the correct one. Until explicitly (and globally) proven otherwise, there are no "aliens" on Earth, no UFOs are a product of extraterrestrial intelligence, there is no Asari soulmate waiting for you just two Relay jumps away, the Borg are not going to assimilate you (at least in the next couple hours), and that thing in the sky is, in fact, a moon.

First off, this was intense, second off, I havnt read through the entire thread yet, so if some of my points are redundant forgive me.

I think we should look at religion for this, primarily to help explain the belief/skepticism.
There are people who believe without a doubt that the earth was created in a short amount of time, etc, etc, a man was able to spread an ocean and lead a group of escaped slaves across the now dry sea floor, and release the sea upon the Egyptians chasing them. There are also those who believe that a man was the son of god, and the true prophet of said God. They can throw all sorts of evidence, but the people who do not believe, will not be swayed.

Now transfer this to extraterrestrials. Though evidence in this field can be more compelling, skeptics are still going to be skeptic, likely untill something not of this world is staring them in the face, or cutting them open to check out their kidneys, or whatever it is the supposed visitors do. Even then they may repress memories, or attempt to justify them with a coping mechanism. (In the film the Fourth Kind the victims apparently repeatedly see an owl.)

I personally think that there is life aside from us, it is arrogant, in my opinion to assume so. Many of you have been raising questions as to why we have not detected them, if they have visited us. My answer is this, (though i doubt that extraterrestrials have visited earth in the past thousand years) they dont want us to know we are there. Honestly, if a race had the technological prowess to travel between solar systems in a timely manner, can we honestly assume that they would not have technologies able to mask their presence from our own technologies, which are likely primitive in comparison?

 

[dmase]

why wouldn't they make themselves known?

Why would they want to make themselves known?

Questions such as these don't work. We have no basis at all on which to presume the attributes of extraterrestrial life.

Back to the OP, it would not be so difficult if people accepted that there was a probability of alien life. Personally, since the universe is seemingly very large, I think it would be a bit stupid to definitively say that Earth is the only inhabited planet. Typically the nay-sayers I come across are mildly religious, which I find a bit strange because their beliefs are placed in something that has yet to be proven.

Thats just it though this goes with my other question they have if you look at the videos and such. They did it by accident though. Videos where a flying saucer will hover in a camera frame for 5 minutes or showin up on thes cope of jet plane's radar and pilot will see it. They are most likely hoaxs or are just misinterrpurtations. UFOs wouldn't make themselves seen if they didn't want to so they haven't openly came down but they have more or less let themselves be seen in small amounts. I figure they would be advanced enough to have tech to sense scanning equipment and such and avoid areas where humans inhavit to stop and catch a breath of fresh air(or something)

I do agree with you in believing their is life out there and most likely intelligent life somewhere else but under my assumption of how life came to be its a one in a billion chance. A completely random occurence that the amino acids formed the right chains to prduce the first organisms. if you counted up all the planets only some would be able to support life completely. Of those planets there is a billionth of a chance for life to develop.

When i say a livable planet i mean something that could have a completely heavy atmosphere as well not just how earth's is. It doesn't seem like it would be widespread at all.

 

[crudus]

I can easily point out some flaws in that by sending you to http://www.stantonfriedman.com/index.php?ptp=articles&fdt=2009.02.03 at least for the propulsion issues visit the rest of the site for the rest.

Sorry, I forgot to list my assumptions

1. God doesn't exist.
2. Evolution takes the roughly the same amount of time in each solar system.

I know how aliens would get here. The problem with that article is it seems to assume you can just use gravity as an acceleration for as much as you want. You can't. For example, if we use the sun we can only use it until we hit 617.7 km/s then the ship starts drifting from the sun unless some force is used to keep it "close" to the sun which will need to exponentially grow with the centripetal force(γmv^2/r). The only way to do what this article seems to propose is to do it at a black hole which is 1,600 light years from Earth. However, you are stranded after you use it.

There is also a matter of supplies needed for such a journey(which I can't find). Unless they mastered cryosleep or something.

 

[Eggsnham]

Um...that is severe schizophrenia. Visual hallucinations are the rarest form of hallucinations in schizophrenia. I am pretty sure you don't even need hallucinations to be schizophrenic either.

Yep, they are rare, especially ones as vivid as she describes them.

And you don't need to hallucinate to have schizophrenia, being schizo can be as simple as hearing a little voice in the back of your head and not realizing that it is indeed in your head.

 

[Tekkawarrior]

You don't just post it on Youtube mate, you go to the authorities, NASA, FBI, Cops, CIA.

You also can provide DNA etc, the internet is a silly excuse, you need to be on the 6 oclock
news to make someone believe you if you are telling the truth.

 

[TerribleAssassin]

Also, whenever people "describe" the "aliens". They always give them prodomitly human characteristics (eyeballs, 10 digit fingers, legs, general body structure (2 arms where we have them, 2 legs where we have them, a chest cavity), similar face design (eyes, ears, nose and mouth are in the same place as ours), etc).

We have evolved (assuming they also evolved) countless lightyears away, how is it that they managed to develop the same or similar "design" as we did ?

Also, what wouldd they evolve from? This is the only (?) inhabitable planet known and you'd have to go millions of lightyears away to find one that maybe slightly inhabitable.

This is always going to be a controversial subject no matter way you put it so you'd need extraterrestrial evidence to prove some thing thats extraterrestrial.

 

[Gilhelmi]

I can easily point out some flaws in that by sending you to http://www.stantonfriedman.com/index.php?ptp=articles&fdt=2009.02.03 at least for the propulsion issues visit the rest of the site for the rest.

Sorry, I forgot to list my assumptions

1. God doesn't exist.
2. Evolution takes the roughly the same amount of time in each solar system.

I know how aliens would get here. The problem with that article is it seems to assume you can just use gravity as an acceleration for as much as you want. You can't. For example, if we use the sun we can only use it until we hit 617.7 km/s then the ship starts drifting from the sun unless some force is used to keep it "close" to the sun which will need to exponentially grow with the centripetal force(γmv^2/r). The only way to do what this article seems to propose is to do it at a black hole which is 1,600 light years from Earth. However, you are stranded after you use it.

There is also a matter of supplies needed for such a journey(which I can't find). Unless they mastered cryosleep or something.

Other assumptions you made are that,
1. All the stars are the same age.
2. Life on planets started at the same age for each different star.
If you remove these assumption it is possible that ET has a million or even a billion years on us so technology augments are really a mote point.

Someone PMd me this (I assume they wish their identity to be concealed because they did not post here)

What your starting to learn is that something is definately amiss with everything. Your right on that part. But targetting the wrong place. The results of the experiment get tainted when the rat knows its in a lab.

Which would explain why the aliens do not want to communicate with us.

 

[swolf]

"To those who believe, no explanation is necessary. To those who do not, none will suffice." - Joseph Dunniger

Plus, normal people + anonymity = jerks.

Plus, without definitive undeniable proof that's something that many people will not believe. I think it's possible but unlikely.

So it's like the jerk-wad theory?

OT:To try to prove that the saw something.

What's the jerk-wad theory?

 

[crudus]

Other assumptions you made are that,
1. All the stars are the same age.
2. Life on planets started at the same age for each different star.
If you remove these assumption it is possible that ET has a million or even a billion years on us so technology augments are really a mote point.

1. No I didn't. Sol is older than Alpha Centari(the closest star(s) to us). I wasn't going to look at all the stars within 100 light years.
2. No I didn't. I used Alpha Centari as an example since it is the most like our own which means there is the highest probability for intelligent life and if intelligent life existed then we would be the first place they went. It would be pointless for me to use Polaris as an example since it is 430ly away. I will admit I should have chosen more stars but the farther stars I chose the less likely aliens were to visit from.

 

[Kinguendo]

I know, they dont even pay attention... it makes all that photoshopping a complete waste of time.