All very good points! As you indicated, the idea that beings so incredibly advanced as they would have to be compared to us would be technically unable to entirely avoid ever accidentally betraying their presence to us, despite not wishing to contact us seems so far fetched that this may be one of the most compelling arguments against the UFO sightings actually being evidence of extraterrestrial visitors from other solar systems.Chap wrote: ↑Sun Jun 06, 2021 10:05 amThat's part of my attitude to any interpretation of these reports in terms of visits to our planet by extra-terrestrials. Basically, in order to interpret them as such, we need to make the following suppositions:Gadianton wrote: It's not enough to convince me, and I'm one of those who hold the opinion of interstellar distances being too vast.
(a) We know enough about our own solar system to be pretty sure that it contains no technically advanced species other than our own. Any visiting extraterrestrials must therefore also be extra-solar. and thus have traversed distances from which light takes (at minimum) several years to reach us.
(b) Thus any supposed visiting ETs must have technology that enables them to travel at speeds that current physics says are impossible. But, even though they do not seem to have any wish to contact us, they still seem technically unable to avoid betraying their presence from time to time. Really? But they have still managed to avoid emitting any radio signals from their home planet that might reveal their presence, despite decades of careful searching on our part.
Basically, the supposition that these reports are simply do with features of our technology, our natural environment on earth, and the perceptions and witness statements of human observers that we do not yet fully understand is hugely less improbable that the 'interstellar visitors' supposition. But of course, the fact that the latter supposition is much more exciting than the first means that news organisations love to do 'what-ifs' about it, and people love to tickle their fancies by allowing themselves to believe it might well be the case.
Reality is sometimes a bit of a party pooper, I know ...
The idea that something like the Alcubierre warp drive that would enable us to reach the stars might actually be possible might seem both appealing and exciting, but, so far, that doesn't seem to be anything close to becoming a reality.