A Modern Description of UFO Sightings
The Milky Way, or just ‘The Galaxy’, is an amazing thing to think about. Its diameter is about 100,000 light years, and it has a thickness of about 12,000 light years. Since light travels at about 186,282 miles per second and there are 31,556,926 seconds in a year, we can start to get an idea of how big our galaxy is – with some great leaps of imagination. In fact, these are probably pretty difficult numbers for the human mind to get around.
Since there are between 200 and 400 billion stars in the Milky Way, our sun is but a grain of sand in a full sandbox. We can’t really include the Earth in the sandbox; we’d have to start talking about moving to a small beach where the smaller grains of sand might then represent the number of satellites revolving around the larger stars.
People who spend time thinking about these numbers, almost invariably wonder about the chances of life existing somewhere else on that beach. The probability seems to increase when we consider that there are billions of galaxies in the universe. But considering the way that the elements are scattered about, and the numerous possibilities for the layout of planets in the galaxy, it seems entirely plausible that life exists somewhere else in the Milky Way. When we include the time dimension, it seems like the chance of extra-terrestrial life having existed in the past or existing in the future increases even more.
While daydreaming about big numbers, probability, physics, chemistry and biology is fun, it doesn’t really tell us anything about life existing somewhere else in the universe. As it stands, we can’t even be sure that our solar system is not the only one like it in the universe. This doesn’t stem our curiosity however, and humankind’s attempt to obtain greater understanding of its surroundings will likely continue unabated for as long as possible.
Then there are those who are convinced they have witnessed evidence of extra-terrestrial life. This evidence, generally anecdotal in nature, includes everything from unidentified flying object sightings to crashed extra-terrestrial spacecraft and space alien abductions. Some immediately write the purveyors of these sightings and abductions off as insane, but there may be more to their claims than sheer delusion.
For example, people who claim to have been abducted by aliens are perhaps more ‘open’ to alternative experiences. While psychologists have determined that most of these people are not insane in the clinical sense of the word, they have found that almost without exception, alien abduction claimants have a tendency to fantasize and hold unusual beliefs and ideas about a wide variety of paranormal phenomena.[1] In short, what is described as 'openness' by the abducted, might be described as fantasy by a researcher.
Far more numerous than those who believe they were abducted, are those who feel they have visually engaged a craft from another world. UFO sighting reports are generally anecdotal, but sometimes include photographic or video evidence. In some cases a large number of independent sightings in the same area are reported simultaneously.
While researching such sightings, there are two primary considerations to keep in mind. First of all, as with those who claim abduction, confirmation bias cannot be excluded as an important psychological factor of the case. As Malcolm Gladwell recently pointed out, confirmation bias is an extremely common human psychological phenomenon.[2] People from all walks of life regularly make snap judgments and then spend considerable time and effort looking for, or even altering, data to support their preconceived notions. Secondly, the human visual experience is often hardly more trustworthy than the human psychological experience. People of all walks of life, and with perfect eyesight, are regularly tricked by naturally occurring optical illusions.
Keeping those facts in mind, numerous researchers and scientists have spent large amounts of time and effort investigating UFO sightings. The following are some of the results of those investigations.
Hoaxes:
A large number of sightings have been exposed as hoaxes, including most photographic or video evidence of flying saucers. Often the motivation for the hoax is monetary gain. Economically depressed towns are often the location of UFO crashes, and people selling books on UFOs are often found to be somehow involved in sightings. Sometimes the motivation is unknown, as in the release of road flares tied to helium balloons that caused a rash of reports in the Phoenix area recently.[3]Planets and the Moon:
This is one that has tricked experienced pilots in the past. Pilots have been known to ‘chase’ Venus through the sky, sometimes firing upon it, all the while marveling at how well the ‘craft’ was able to keep its distance. In other cases pilots marveled at how they were unable to outrun or outmaneuver the ‘craft’ as it followed them. Similar cases involve misidentifying the reflection of the moon off of cloud cover.[4]Balloons:
Balloons for testing weather and atmospheric conditions have been the cause of a considerable number of false sightings. Often they are seen as shiny fast-moving objects moving across the sky and suddenly disappearing. Of course they tend to disappear when they explode due to the expansion of gases as their altitude increases. This is right after they drop their payload of scientific data collection instruments via parachute.Military and Civilian Aircraft:
Sometimes something moving across the sky is a plane! But sometimes, because of lighting conditions and the distances and speeds involved, the aircraft can be difficult to make out without an optical device like a telescope. The famous 1997 Phoenix sightings turned out to be aircraft and flares dropped from aircraft during a military training exercise.[5]Meteors and Disintegrating Satellites:
Just about anything that is bright and moving quickly across the sky will convince some that extra-terrestrial invaders have arrived.Flocks of Birds:
It’s hard to believe that people could mistake birds for a flying saucer, but it does show how fallible human eyesight is.Weather and Electrical Phenomena:
Some of the most mysterious UFO sightings are attributed to strange weather phenomena. Some events are rare, such as the glow of the moon through fog. Experiencing something like this for the first time can probably seem a bit strange and otherworldly (especially when driving home late at night, tired and alone). Other phenomena that fall into this category includes ball lightning and St. Elmo’s Fire.Lights:
Spotlights aimed toward the sky, and even headlights from a car have been known to convince people that ET was making a landing in the backyard.
While these are the most common causes of UFO reports (90 percent of all reports.[6]), sometimes a UFO investigator can’t actually determine the cause of a sighting. In some cases these unresolved reports are later found to be elaborate hoaxes that the investigator failed to recognize. Other times the case simply remains unsolved.
When there is nothing to go on but anecdotal evidence from a single individual or a handful of people, the investigator really doesn’t have much of a case to begin with. For such investigators it might seem like interviewing someone who claims to have witnessed a crime, but there isn't any evidence that a crime was committed. There is no victim and no perpetrator, just the testimony of a single witness – a pretty worthless case until some sort of tangible evidence turns up. If our justice system convicted people based on nothing more than the testimony of a random witness who may or may not exhibit the trappings of confirmation bias, it would be an unjust world indeed. But in the case of this analogy, there wouldn't even be anyone to convict!
As an afterthought, I have heard of a case that is interesting because of the quality and quantity of eyewitness accounts, as well as because of actual evidence in the form of radar tracking forms. The case is known as Tehran 1976[7], and the quality of the report is high due to several factors, including many independent sightings from the ground, from aircraft personnel, and from air control tower operators who tracked the UFO on radar. While this is easily the most interesting UFO case I’ve heard of, there is no actual evidence therein of extra-terrestrials visiting Earth.
If a strong case like Tehran 1976 doesn’t offer any tangible evidence of extra-terrestrial life, then I guess you really have to ‘want’ to believe to accept any of the weaker cases as credible, particularly when 90 percent of them are easily debunked, sometimes with something as trivial as a flock of birds.
[1] Harvard University Gazette; Alien Abduction Claims Explained; William J. Cromie; Sept. 22, 2005
[2] Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking; Malcolm Gladwell; April 3, 2007
[3] Mysterious Phoenix Lights a UFO Hoax; Live Science; Benjamin Radford; April 28, 2008
[4] Natural Identified Objects; http://www.unmuseum.org/ifonat.htm
[5] Report on Phoenix Light Arrays; http://brumac.8k.com/phoenixlights1.html
[6] Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects, Edward U. Condon, 1968
[7] 1976 Tehran UFO Incident; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1976_Tehran_UFO_incident