Here’s why we should stick, at least for now, with the extraterrestrial explanation for UFOs or UAP
It’s good to be open-minded, to consider all possible options. At the same time, it’s vital not to leap headlong into silliness and titillation, confusing and spreading what is just an opinion or hypothesis as if it was a solid theory or fact. Unfortunately, “ufology” is full of absurdity and self-aggrandisement, resulting in much bullshit, presented as if it was sensible or gospel. It isn’t just a rabbit hole, it’s a smelly rabbit hole. Those who give the impression that they know more than they do should watch or re-watch Game of Thrones, specifically the bit where red-haired Ygritte says: “You know nothing, Jon Snow!”
Occam’s razor is a principle attributed to the 14th century friar, William Ockham. He argued that if you have two or more competing ideas to explain the same phenomenon, you should opt for the simpler one - provided it satisfactorily fits what is known. Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton suggested similar rules.
Sceptics and debunkers will no doubt gleefully jump in at this point and say: “Exactly! Look no further than the explanation of imagination and misidentification, with hoax added for good measure, to explain all UFO sightings!”
Most instances of unidentified flying objects can be conventionally explained, of course, but some remain genuinely perplexing. In the absence of absolute proof, many have taken the reasonable position that the evidence is already strong enough to assume that these anomalous ones are craft or probes from elsewhere.
Understandably, discussion has therefore begun as to possible origins.
Some think that an interdimensional hypothesis might be at least part of an explanation for what’s happening, or perhaps it’s us travelling back from the future. There’s even talk of “ultraterrestrials” who share our planet. Recently, these possibilities have gained traction, winning over more and more supporters. They’ve become fashionable, with many mindlessly climbing aboard the bandwagon.
Could there be other dimensions that coexist separately alongside our own?
However, if we go back to basics, there’s zero evidence for the reality of such exotic suggestions - nothing, zilch - not that this simple fact in any way dissuades endless and ridiculous speculation within “ufology”.
The classic explanation for many decades has been extraterrestrial visitation. UFOs or UAP are solid objects, “nuts and bolts” craft or probes manufactured beyond Earth.
From a betting perspective, the odds of this premise one day proving to be correct have noticeably increased in recent years. Science has now identified that planets exist in other solar systems. And there’s a lot of them - an estimated 300 million to 40 billion just within our own Milky Way galaxy. Furthermore, many exist within the habitable zone, raising the possibility that life might have started on them. There’s a growing expectation within the scientific community that life will soon be discovered on one or more of these exoplanets; the search for biosignatures and technosignatures has begun.
Counterarguments centre around the dangers of space travel and the immense distances between star systems. Is it possible to travel faster than the speed of light? But those considerable challenges become ultimately irrelevant if visitors are here, even if we don’t yet understand how other civilisations have managed to solve these big problems. If they have, they have - somehow, which is a separate matter.
The atmosphere of this blue exoplanet is too hot for it to be habitable, but others will be suitable for life (Credit: NASA)
If UFOs are craft and probes from advanced extraterrestrial civilisations, it’s not unreasonable to think that their technology will be very different from what we know and understand. Some of it might appear as borderline magic, hard to grasp, even mind-boggling, because it will be so far ahead of anything we’ve produced. The smartphones we have today are unimaginably different from the original telephones with cords that I knew as a child growing up in the 1960s. And 60+ years is almost nothing - a mere blink of the eye - in the vastness of time. There might be intelligent lifeforms “out there” which are millions, or possibly even billions, of years ahead of where we are in terms of evolutionary and technological development.
The problem with having smartphones and universities etc is that we think we’re clever. Yes, there’s a good argument that we’re an intelligent species - although Monty Python had a point when they sang: “Pray that there’s intelligent life somewhere out in space, ‘cause there’s bugger all down here on Earth!” It’s more exact to define human beings as an emerging intelligent species. A lot of shit keeps us semi-primitive and dysfunctional. As we keep banging on and on about, usually to deaf ears, the bitching and moaning, aggression, contradictory and hypocritical behaviour, psychological avoidance, and self-preoccupation, etc etc isn’t flattering. We’ve got a long way to go before we can call ourselves mature, as different from immature or adolescent. So a dose of humility wouldn’t come amiss.
If we knew, now, the competence of those behind the UFOs or UAP, it would surely be humbling. Their level of capability will, in all likelihood, be very far ahead of ours. Yes, there has to be a ceiling to technological progress - an ultimate limit to what’s possible - but it could be a long way above anything we can presently imagine.
Our journey into space has barely begun. I hadn’t yet reached my first birthday when Sputnik 1 was launched into low Earth orbit by the Soviet Union on 4th October 1957. Yuri Gagarin then briefly went into space on 12th April 1961. Perspective is important: we’re still beginners.
Some of the best UFO cases indicate tiny bits and pieces of what I’m suggesting. The anomalous craft appear to be using a different means of moving - and I’m deliberately using this word “moving” instead of “flying” - with no visible propulsion system, and no conventional flight surfaces such as wings or propellers. They can outmanoeuvre our best aircraft. And there’s no genuine indication that their craft or probes crash from time to time, like human-made ones do, as we explored in our film about the Roswell Incident.
If we might be seriously underestimating their level of development, blinkered by our own tendency towards projecting onto others what we think of as normal, then it’s time for a complete re-think. We must stop displacing, and refrain from assuming that our paradigm is correct or the only one in town. As Becky, our director, said a few times in our recent mini-series of films: “They’re not us.” Technologically, the “nuts and bolts” of their vehicles might still be “nuts and bolts”, but a super-advanced form that we almost certainly won’t recognise. Again, as we stressed in our films: “Advanced is advanced.”
It’s been argued that UFOs have been here for such a long time - going back much further than the 1940s - that they “can’t possibly” be visitors from elsewhere in the galaxy, and therefore “must” somehow co-exist in some kind of a multiverse or as “ultraterrestrials”. It’s also been asserted that the number of genuine anomalous craft is many more than would be required to survey our planet. These rationales, however, are flawed. They fail to identify a deeper psychological motivation and a time-rarity event that could certainly explain why what’s happening here on planet Earth will be of definite galactic interest.
So it’s premature, to say the least, to turn to the exotic suggestion of “interdimensional” for a possible answer, when we obviously still have much to discover and understand about the physical universe we do know exists. It would be easy to misinterpret something that we might perhaps feebly try to describe as a “porthole”, when the reality is we haven’t got a clue about what we don’t yet know. Male peacocks rightly display their colourful feathers to attract a breeding mate, but too many of those in “ufology” just strut their stuff to cover up insecurity, inadequacy, and ignorance. They don’t know when it’s best to keep quiet, so they obsessively waffle.
What is - or should be - blatantly obvious to everyone with half a brain cell is that human beings are too immature for open contact with advanced civilisations. The countless problems we create for ourselves are no less than a crime against one another. We’re ridiculously infantile. And the core reason isn’t exactly rocket science: it’s the “me, me, me”, “me, first”, or “me and mine” mentality.
We shouldn’t underestimate what’s “out there” amongst the stars before looking elsewhere for a possible answer
It wasn’t that long ago when everyone believed we were at the centre of the universe, with all the stars etc revolving around us. In a similar sense, people are still conditioned into thinking that the self-orientated psychology and behaviour is how life should be. But it’s only a mindset, with the self-imposed limitations caused and perpetuated by psychological avoidance.
How this tragedy of the human situation hasn’t been more widely identified is an insult to intelligence. If anyone with spare time on their hands wants something to figure out, forget other dimensions or time travel, and just look in the mirror. You’ll soon start to see why extraterrestrial visitors aren’t landing to come and say “Hello”. We’re backward.
They’ll unequivocally understand our situation - better than we do - so we need to wise up.
Merry Christmas, everyone, from the EvolveFirst.org team!
Written by Iain Scott, 20th December 2022