Do UFO sightings have an evolution?

From precedent when we discover another civilization we tend to trample them. Example when European’s discovered native American Indians they were trampled underfoot, for land and commodities. Aliens might just want our gold. Or they have a taste for humans, flesh or entertainment or culture. personally I still think it is possible for the human race to be in an alien zoo and we are in a sanctuary, like a bird sanctuary, but for humans.

Yeah, my guess is if aliens came here, we’d probably slaughter them, but we’d be pretty fucked if they were more advanced than us, and had no problem kicking our asses.

@Symbeline And what if we were the first to meet them in their/there home planet… would we wipe them out for commodities.

Yeah say like, we traveled to some other planet and the beings were ’‘inferior’’, or no more ’‘advanced’’ than animals on Earth, I have no problem believing we’d raid the place, if there were materials or resources and shit we wanted, and could use.

And hell, as you point out, we waged war on other humans on our own planet…black slavery, the destruction of Indians, the Holocaust…so even if those beings were intelligent, it’s not too hard imagining certain outcomes. And science would probably take it upon itself to capture some of these beings to study them.

Well, some people do interpret things like this as ancient UFOs.
And this is supposed to be a prehistoric depiction of a grey alien

So Ufologists will tell you, that yes, UFO and alien sightings have been going on throughout history, despite the fact the we know none of the artists’ intentions when they drew the things they drew.

As for the shape of the UFO’s, well, do you think they would
1. Use only one shape of craft,
2. Not develop new types of craft?

Humans do it too. We started with Balloons, then went to Zeppelins, Biplanes, Monoplanes, and then finally jet planes.
They all come in different shapes and sizes, while, depending on type, they all share a basic shape.
Then there are outliers, like the flying wings pioneered by the Horten Brothers, which the americans stole and turned into the B2 bomber. They are also jet planes, but have a radically different shape than conventional aircraft.
Last but not least there is the completely different type of aircraft called helicopters.

So these sightings having variety in the shapes of UFOs is not an argument against the interpretation of them being alien craft.
In fact, the shapes staying the same over that period, with no variation whatsoever, would be a bigger strike against it.

There has to be life of some sort somewhere in the universe, I mean, it’s so fucking big!!
My theory, the big bang created such an epic echo, stretching out to infinity, that another Earth, identical in every way, was formed,
An exact replica, a mirror image to our own rock, that’s right, somewhere in the vast void that is space another @Symbeline asked this question & another @ucme is answering it at precisely the same time.
This may seem like another piss take, but I assure you i’m deadly serious…this time :)

…& another @ucme is answering…
Just wrote that again because I like to see my name in red

I would expect there is an alien evolution of sorts. There is ample archeological evidence of human achievements done at chronological times that bear scrutiny in how such relatively primitive societies were able to construct pyramids, Stonehenge, accurately identify stars and solar systems modern man didn’t yet know about??

This site has 7 pages of very compelling pictographs, carvings, sculptures and cave drawings that makes it hard to discount that the ancients were indeed visited and assisted either by aliens or by Marty McFly and a mad scientist in a DeLorean.

I have been open to the existence of extraterrestrial life all of my life, and never been given any reason to believe it exists. I wanted (and still want) to believe, but there’s no reliable evidence.

I came to maturity in the 1970’s and there was heavy drug use during that time. It also appears to be the apex of UFO sightings. I think there is a lesson there.

I did my share of drugs, and I did my share of shy searching, but I still never say anything unnatural.

I think a military or scientific research equipment or space stations would have picked up something by now if there was anything out there visiting us.

Humans have incredible imaginations and will immediately translate an ancient people’s image of man or a god into an alien.

I honestly don’t find any of the information compelling. There is very likely some forms of life on other planets but it would be very unlikely to have a head, arms, legs and feet; we developed in response to our own unique environments. We project.

@ragingloli I understand your points, but as far as evolution goes, I was more along the lines of what @MadMadMax is saying; aliens seem to be our own self projections, therefore along the years they ’‘evolve’’ along with our interpretation of them.
If you look at movies, aliens are always just two things;

Monsters we can’t communicate with, like a xenomorph, or humanoids who are defined by one very specific human trait, like a klingon, or a predator. (Vulcans probably being the most original ’‘aliens’’ if you ask me)
As I wasn’t talking about fictional aliens initially, I’ll drop that, it’s just that to me, real aliens always seem too close to what you see in movies. They’re very human, and often, sightings don’t exclude that. That is not to say aliens can’t be similar to us, but we give them those traits in many situations in which we’ve probably never encountered any.

In fact, the shapes staying the same over that period, with no variation whatsoever, would be a bigger strike against it.

But why? If we don’t know a single thing about what is out there, assuming there is, we can’t make that claim. Your whole argument is based on the idea that aliens evolve; which is very logical, and I can accept that, but one can’t confirm it unless one knows for sure these aliens exist, and have studied them. What if they had developed a craft 300 years ago that meets all their needs, and don’t need to create any more modifications or models? What if said race of aliens does not see, or use science as we do?

@ucme @ucme @ucme

There, your name in red, three times. XD So if I understand, they’re not all the same you, but all different yous. Interesting theory, but I have a question. Are all these other mirror us’ses (how the hell can you possibly pluralize the word ’‘us’’ lol) physically alive somewhere on the other side of the universe? Say if we ever develop spaceships that can go all the way across the universe, would we be able to meet our own selves? Or do we all do the same thing, at the same time? Meaning that if I had a spaceship and went to meet myself, I’d just crash into the other myself who’s traveling in a spaceship, coming to meet me? Or is it impossible to meet one another, as we all live in different dimensions which cannot be traveled to, at least physically?

@Cruiser Yes, like for example, check out this Egyptian drawing. A light bulb, apparently. So either man was very advanced centuries ago on his own, or another life form helped us out, (or we stole it) or this is a hoax. But there are a lot of drawings and things like that from long ago which suggest that ancient man has used modern technology…or at least, has seen it. Too many to discount the possibility. And we still don’t know what the fuck crop circles are, or what purpose they might have…or even who is doing them. Is it people? And why?
This goes into the whole thing there; we don’t know everything about what lives on Earth, or everything about our own history…so it’s hard saying we know much about other life forms.

But now I’m reminded of Marty calling that bad guy in the third movie an asshole; If you don’t duel him, everyone’s gonna say you’re a coward!
Marty; Who cares, he’s an asshole! LOL

@ibstubro The 70’s were the apex UFO sightings? This observation reminds me of certain disorders and stuff…like nocturnal paralysis; in the middle ages, they blamed it on ghosts and vampires that visited you during the night; today, a lot of people who claim to have been captured and experimented on by aliens were known to have suffered sleep paralysis. I suffer from this myself, and it’s very easy to believe it’s something supernatural when it happens…that is, when you’re not informed on what it actually is. I also believe in other life forms, however there are probably a whole lot of factors which can be considered, and then used to discount most sightings or experiences people have had.

Dawwww, phanx babe, you’re the gift that keeps giving XD
I guess what I meant was a parallel universe, where we can meet, but never, ever, under any circumstances shall we touch our alien twin.
The mess would be stomach churning…truly.

I had never heard of sleep paralysis, that I recall, @Symbeline, so you’ve informed me. Interesting and unsettling.

When I was a kid in the 70’s I was convinced I would one day see a UFO. Now that I’ve had 40 years of watching and waiting, I’m a little jaded. I tend to be the same way about ghosts and God. Neither believer nor disbeliever. Open minded, but doubtful.

@ibstubro
I had sleep paralysis only a short while ago. It was moderately unsettling.

@ibstubro Yeah, I have it like once or twice a week, then it leaves for a month, and comes back. You can’t move, and it is often associated with a dream. You see your surroundings, so it makes the dream seem so real. The first time it did happen to me, I actually believed in ghosts for a bit, until I did some research.
So what did you see in 70’s? What did it look like?

@ucme So no touching our alien twins, huh? Haha so many jokes to be made here, most tasteless…which is the way to go, of course.

Carl Sagan’s book The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark notes that throughout history, what humans have observed in the skies has changed with the expectations and fears of the time. The ancients saw fire breathing dragons and winged horses pulling chariots driven by their gods. In Medieval times, they saw Incubi and Succubi, witches, demons and such. UFOs of the kind we hear reported today did not make their appearance till humans took to the skies in hot air balloons and dirigibles, and then they looked more like those airships than flying soup bowls, cloches and bucket hats, or triangles. In face, triangles made their appearance after the flying wing made its debut in 1949.

@ETpro So I was on to something, at least. Thanks for letting me know the origin of the triangles, was wondering about that. Gonna check out that vid now.

Tasteless? I know of no other way.

@Symbeline There have been a number of aircraft introduced that are much more like a flying isosceles triangle. It’s entirely possible that some UFO sightings do involve secret experimental military aircraft. Some also must involve the ever fertile human imagination, though. If not, we wouldn’t see the constant shift in sightings as people’s superstitions change.

@ucme If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. :)

@ETpro Indeed, this is the reasoning behind my question…also I’ve never thought of experimental crafts flying around. I mean, that seems a lot more plausible to me.

Here’s this thing I saw once, at night, during the Summer. Two little red lights in the sky, that seemed to shake and vibrate as they flew, but both lights moved n sync, as if they were attached to something. I first thought, dude, UFO. I watched it as much as I could until it went out of sight, and it seemed to be getting higher, so my reasoning was, it’s flying over the planet, because if it was in our orbit, would it not appear to descend into the horizon?

However, I know absolutely nothing about any aircraft, they were just ’‘right away suppositions’’ I made at the time, and stuck with. But now after reading this, it was maybe some experimental aircraft, like maybe one of those planes they use to fuck up radar signals and shit? Those go pretty high. It didn’t make any noise at all. Was just weird, because whatever it was seemed to be convulsing as it went along, at least from what I could tell by the lights; that’s all I could see, if it had a body, wasn’t seeing it.
I HAVE noticed that if a plane is high enough in the sky, you won’t hear it. (although they are so high that you could only see this during the day, not at night)

In primary school, while waiting in front of the school building at 6:30 in the morning, I saw a ring of 6 red constantly shining lights in the sky, slowly moving east.

Human society interprets the unknown in light of current culture, so the answer to your question is an obvious yes.

In pre-Biblical times, sightings were related to God or gods. In the Roman era, we had mythological Roman and Greek gods referenced in regard to sightings.

In the modern era, with our technology and knowledge of space, we obviously see these things as potentially physical creatures like us from other planets.

So the bias is obviously there.

The real question here is, is whatever is behind this exploiting this bias? That is, are “they” intentially manifesting in a manner that the culture of the time can accept, and that this is not just an interpretive phenomenon from a human perspective?

Carl Sagan once asked, how would an alien culture a million years in advance of us view us? They would probably see us as a bush baby or a macaw (nothing more than a clever form of animal life).

Any intelligence that is far in advance of us – we have to assume, could easily manipulate us and our impression of them.

That makes Stephen Hawking’s warnings that we should certainly NOT be trying to contact alien life all the more pertinent.

In terms of, do I feel the sightings are legitimate, that something real is actually happening?

Yes I do.

Interesting answer, and I like the fact that whether one believes that sightings are actually something, or made up, your answer still makes sense either way. At least, works for me on both sides, so far as I can understand.

Thanks Symbeline! I try to be objective…