Next time you're at the beach, try counting the individual grains of sand that cling to your feet. Such a task might just give you a greater appreciation for the immense enormity of the cosmos. As you sit comfortably in your sandy beach chair in the hot summer sun, have a look at the size of the beach you are sun bathing on. If just the grains of sand that clung to your feet seemed too incredibly numerous to count, try to contemplate the number of grains of sand that must comprise only this small strip of land you see before you. Then consider the possibility that there could easily be more stars in the universe than there are grains of sand, not just on the beach you happen to be relaxing on, but on every beach and desert on planet earth -- combined.
The universe is immense beyond our ability to comprehend it.
Clearly, there exist a seemingly endless supply of stars in the universe. If we are to assume planet formation is a natural by-product of star formation, the prospect of life elsewhere grows ever stronger. Accordingly, hardly a week goes by that we don't hear yet another planet was discovered orbiting another star in our galaxy. Early on in the process, we were only finding super Jupiters, but as detection technology has improved, earth-sized worlds are now being discovered left and right. The odds of life existing elsewhere in the universe appear greater each and every day that goes by.
We all seem to understand these facts reasonably well. Almost everybody now believes there is life out there somewhere, in some form. Most believe that the universe is positively crowded with life. So, what is it that makes the idea of visitation so outlandish? Is it cultural baggage? A ridicule factor that has carried over from a time of more primitive cosmological understanding? Or, is it an attitude cultivated by a media complying, at some level or another, with a behind-the-scenes government effort reflecting the recommendations of some panel of experts to discredit the subject (for whatever reason) by any means necessary? Of course, the Robertson Panel of 1953 made these very recommendations -- to use the media for purposes of "training and debunking." That is a matter of public record.
It is curious how confident most critics are in their dismissal. Confidence in dismissal, and willingness to ruthlessly ridicule all manner of ETH advocates equally (often out of character for some when compared with their more civil responses to other topics of less merit), tends to go hand-in-hand with ignorance of the most basic of facts on UFOs. How can one reconcile a strong belief in life elsewhere in the universe (perhaps more accurately described as "confidence in the incredibly high probability of..." as opposed to a "belief") with a true belief (faith oriented, this time) that UFOs are surely pure fiction? So sure of this fact are the critics that actually assessing the available evidence isn't even necessary! If critics were to be truly objective they would review the largest, highest quality scientific studies on the matter (such as Project Bluebook Special Report 14 or the French COMETA report) before espousing firm conclusions. How can one defend the integrity of science over superstition and religious zealotry by addressing a scientifically plausible hypothesis via dismissive, subjective proclamation instead of objective, scientific investigation?
For further contradictions of reason, consider that the same scientists that assure us ET visitation is an impossibility tend to be the same that romanticize the near future potential for the human race to set out for the stars ourselves. In the same vein, the very same scientists that tell us it would be virtually impossible for "them" to find us, spend their lives searching for "them" with primitive earthly technology, and do so with full confidence of a future discovery. "'They' certainly can't do it, but maybe we can," seems to be the arrogant logic. We have been inadvertently telegraphing our existence and location to the cosmos with radio waves for over a century. Yet, the critics argue, "they" couldn't possibly know of our existence or location. But if "they" are using the same technology, we could discover their existence and location!
Let us not forget, the Earth is only ~4.5 billion years old. The universe is in excess of 13 billion. There are sun-like stars in our local galactic neighborhood that are a billion years older than ours. A BILLION years... (to better understand the immense scale of a "billion," consider the fact that 1 billion seconds is equivalent to about 30 years) Look how far we have come in the past 100 years, technologically speaking. Technological trends appear to be solidly exponential in virtually all cases. Ray Kurzweil has dubbed this the "Law of Accelerating Returns." We can only assume this trend is the same with other potential civilizations. Considering this trend, we should expect 10,000 years worth of technological progress over the next century when compared to the last. 100,000,000 years worth of progress in the century that follows, and so on. Innovation is not a sporadic process. Even today, many of us struggle to keep up with the latest cell phone and social media trends. Look how much has changed dramatically in just the past decade! As with the vastness of the universe, the technological capability of a civilization a thousand years ahead of us is beyond our ability to comprehend, let alone a million, or billion years ahead. Such technology would appear to us like magic!
Let us not forget, the Earth is only ~4.5 billion years old. The universe is in excess of 13 billion. There are sun-like stars in our local galactic neighborhood that are a billion years older than ours. A BILLION years... (to better understand the immense scale of a "billion," consider the fact that 1 billion seconds is equivalent to about 30 years) Look how far we have come in the past 100 years, technologically speaking. Technological trends appear to be solidly exponential in virtually all cases. Ray Kurzweil has dubbed this the "Law of Accelerating Returns." We can only assume this trend is the same with other potential civilizations. Considering this trend, we should expect 10,000 years worth of technological progress over the next century when compared to the last. 100,000,000 years worth of progress in the century that follows, and so on. Innovation is not a sporadic process. Even today, many of us struggle to keep up with the latest cell phone and social media trends. Look how much has changed dramatically in just the past decade! As with the vastness of the universe, the technological capability of a civilization a thousand years ahead of us is beyond our ability to comprehend, let alone a million, or billion years ahead. Such technology would appear to us like magic!
ET visitors need not shatter the known laws of physics to travel here, however. Just 50% the speed of light could complete an interstellar round trip between much of the stars in our own galactic neighborhood within a lifetime. However, that is assuming a "lifetime" is anything close to a human lifespan, unenhanced by potential advancements in nanotechnology already on the horizon for our own civilization, and within many of OUR lifetimes or those of our children. More significantly, that scenario also assumes that they even have a "home planet" to return to at all. Perhaps they are content to inhabit deep space and any planets, moons or asteroids along the way.
Perhaps, some argue, they have found us, but consider us too uninterestingly inferior to pay us any attention and have since moved on. It is unlikely such an incurious race of beings would have developed such advanced technology while harboring such a disinterest in scientific discovery and investigation. No matter how inferior we might appear, even if we are no more interesting to them than an ant colony or pond scum are to us human beings, you can still find scores of scientists that devote whole lives to their study.
Perhaps, some argue, they have found us, but consider us too uninterestingly inferior to pay us any attention and have since moved on. It is unlikely such an incurious race of beings would have developed such advanced technology while harboring such a disinterest in scientific discovery and investigation. No matter how inferior we might appear, even if we are no more interesting to them than an ant colony or pond scum are to us human beings, you can still find scores of scientists that devote whole lives to their study.
The scientific community once scoffed at reports of rocks falling from the sky. Validation did not come for some time. NASA just recently offered us another past reminder of both the unproductive nature of a dismissive attitude, as well as the vindicated reliability of pilot eyewitness testimony -- sprites. Upper atmosphere electrical discharges that were often sighted and reported by pilots quite accurately, but dismissed by the scientific community. Investigation apparently was not a priority of mainstream science. In retrospect, in this case at least, the pilots descriptions of aerial observations were remarkably accurate after all.
This is by no means an indictment of the scientific method itself, which is without a doubt the best method we have for "interrogating the universe" (as Carl Sagan would say), but rather a criticism of the arrogance of the mainstream scientific establishment.
There is no good reason I can find to assuredly dismiss the possibility of ET visitation. In fact, we might expect such visitation. For this reason, among others, I find the study of UFOs to be a worthy endeavor (perhaps even "obligation") of science.
