Is there a “UAP phenomenon” worth studying?

[Andreas]

This discussion came up in another thread, and I want to continue it here. Personally, I see no reason to study the so-called "UAP phenomenon" scientifically, since I see no reason to believe such a phenomenon exists. To me, UAPs only exist in the LIZ, and not even better equipment will help us, since it will only move the "phenomenon" further into the distance. When people claim we should conduct more scientific studies on UAPs, I'm personally confused about what that even means.

It might sound like a reasonable demand. We want to know what those blurry videos actually show and what the "whistleblowers" are actually talking about, don't we? But when people make such demands, it's often implied that the "UAP phenomenon" is something anomalous—something strange that has been kept secret from the public. The sad truth, however, is that after seeing piles of videos, we still have no real reason to believe that's the case.

To me, the role of a skeptic should be quite passive. It is important to react to the videos that are released and to comment on the claims being made. But I will never demand more material showing "strange stuff." I will never stand on the barricades demanding more data and more information. If it looks like a pig, walks like a pig, and smells like a pig, then it's probably a pig. I don't need additional data confirming that it's actually a pig. Someone claiming it's a cow will need to provide the evidence themselves.

Not wanting to spend government dollars and scientists' time studying a phenomenon that has not been confirmed to be real seems to be an extreme opinion nowadays. But that's my humble opinion, and I'm happy to be challenged on it.

 

[JMartJr]

Any scientist who studied UFOs and found a new phenomenon would make their career... if they discovered aliens or the like they'd achieve immortal fame.

Few scientists choose to study them. None of the ones that have done so made any important discoveries. Correct me if I am missing something, everybody, but as far as I can tell none of them have discovered any moderately important discoveries. Or any minor discoveries.

It does not seem that they think there is anything there worth their time and effort. Ask scientists if they'd support UFOs being studied, many will say "Yes," as scientists are seldom opposed to the quest for knowledge. Ask if they'll switch from their current work to UFOlogy, I doubt they'll be interested, if they were they'd have been studying them already.

Me, if any scientist wants to study UFOs, I'm all for it. Knock yourselves out, folks, and good luck to you. If they'd rather study something else, that they feel is more likely to produce something of value, I'm all for it.

If they don't want to do work on the topic, what are we going to do, force them?

I guess anybody is free to raise some money and try to hire some of them. I think you'll need some deep pockets, if there is little interest among researchers.

 

[Ann K]

I'm willing to dump it in the laps of the True Believers for now. I disbelieve there to be any inter-stellar component or non-human entity behind the sightings which get the UFOlogists all a-twitter, and that s true for the "anomalous" (unidentified) things as well as the ones we can identify. But, like any good scientist, I'm willing to revisit my beliefs IF AND WHEN some credible evidence surfaces. It's just not my job to dig it out, and that's the thing I'll cheerfully leave to those who make the claims.

 

[MonkeeSage]

I think often the call for further scientific study of UAP means something like more data being collected and analyzed to see if there are any anomalies. I think this can be a good thing if done well and privately funded rather than government subsidized.

For example, the Galileo Project's array of FLIR cameras and data processing pipeline, can be useful for skeptics in that it shows that even with better sensors, data and analysis, almost everything detected is attributable to mundane causes, which establishes a concrete base rate. It can also provide examples of what mundane objects can look like (see image from paper below). And if there ever are actual anomalies in the outliers (none so far), like apparent instantaneous acceleration, there will be more robust sensor data to analyze rather than just grainy videos.

Papers about the Galileo Project cameras and data processing pipeline:

Domine et al, Commissioning An All-Sky Infrared Camera Array for Detection of Airborne Objects, Feb 2025.
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2411.07956

Abstract: To date, there is little publicly available scientific data on unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) whose properties and kinematics purportedly reside outside the performance envelope of known phenomena. To address this deficiency, the Galileo Project is designing, building, and commissioning a multi-modal, multi-spectral ground-based observatory to continuously monitor the sky and collect data for UAP studies via a rigorous long-term aerial census of all aerial phenomena, including natural and human-made. One of the key instruments is an all-sky infrared camera array using eight uncooled long-wave-infrared FLIR Boson 640 cameras. In addition to performing intrinsic and thermal calibrations, we implement a novel extrinsic calibration method using airplane positions from Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast (ADS-B) data that we collect synchronously on site. Using a You Only Look Once (YOLO) machine learning model for object detection and the Simple Online and Realtime Tracking (SORT) algorithm for trajectory reconstruction, we establish a first baseline for the performance of the system over five months of field operation. Using an automatically generated real-world dataset derived from ADS-B data, a dataset of synthetic 3D trajectories, and a hand-labeled real-world dataset, we find an acceptance rate (fraction of in-range airplanes passing through the effective field of view of at least one camera that are recorded) of 41% for ADS-B-equipped aircraft, and a mean frame-by-frame aircraft detection efficiency (fraction of recorded airplanes in individual frames which are successfully detected) of 36%. The detection efficiency is heavily dependent on weather conditions, range, and aircraft size. Approximately 500,000 trajectories of various aerial objects are reconstructed from this five-month commissioning period. These trajectories are analyzed with a toy outlier search focused on the large sinuosity of apparent 2D reconstructed object trajectories. About 16% of the trajectories are flagged as outliers and manually examined in the IR images. From these ∼80,000 outliers and 144 trajectories remain ambiguous, which are likely mundane objects but cannot be further elucidated at this stage of development without information about distance and kinematics or other sensor modalities. We demonstrate the application of a likelihood-based statistical test to evaluate the significance of this toy outlier analysis. Our observed count of ambiguous outliers combined with systematic uncertainties yields an upper limit of 18,271 outliers for the five-month interval at a 95% confidence level. This test is applicable to all of our future outlier searches.

Figure 32. After manual classification of reconstructed trajectories, we sample typical objects (in pairs) from each category. These images are crops of the objects for illustration purposes. First row: flocks of birds and the Moon; second row: planes and single birds; third row: clouds

Bridgham et al, Galileo Project's Observatory Class System Architecture, May 2025.
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2506.00125v1

Abstract: Scientific investigation of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP) is limited by poor data quality and incomplete data sets. Existing data are often fragmented, uncalibrated, and missing critical metadata. To address these limitations, the authors present the Observatory Class Integrated Computing Platform (OCICP), a system designed for the comprehensive scientific study of aerial phenomena which integrates multiple sensors to collect and analyze data on UAP. The OCICP system consists of two subsystems. The first is the Edge Computing Subsystem which directly interfaces with the sensors and is located within the observatory site. This subsystem performs real-time data acquisition, sensor optimization, and data provenance management. The second is the Post-Processing Subsystem which resides outside the observatory. This subsystem supports data analysis workflows, including commissioning, census operations, science operations, and system effectiveness monitoring. This design and implementation paper describes the system lifecycle, associated processes, design, implementation, and preliminary results of OCICP, emphasizing the system's ability to collect comprehensive, calibrated, and scientifically robust data.

 

[Todd Feinman]

FWIW, the magic 8 ball Google AI.
Survey says!:

"The number of scientists and academics studying Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP) has grown steadily, driven by diminishing stigma and increased government transparency. Peer-reviewed studies, university-level research, and institutional task forces are replacing the fringe reputation of the topic with rigorous scientific inquiry. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]

Key Drivers of the Shift

• Academic Interest: A study published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications showed that over a third of U.S. academics are interested in researching UFOs/UAP, with many pointing to a need for systematic data collection. [1]
• Institutional Recognition: The University of Würzburg in Germany became one of the first Western universities to officially recognize UAP as an object of legitimate academic research. Meanwhile, European institutions like Stockholm University and the Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics actively publish peer-reviewed UAP research. [1]
• Government Declassification: The U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) and the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) continue to release unclassified and declassified data for public vetting. [1, 2, 3]

Notable Scientific Initiatives

• NASA Independent Study: NASA appointed a director of UAP research and assembled a 16-member team to create a roadmap for how the agency can use open-source data, satellites, and scientific tools to help shed light on UAPs. [1, 2, 3]
• The Galileo Project: Headed by Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb, this project focuses on the systematic scientific search for potential extraterrestrial technological artifacts using a global network of telescopes and high-resolution cameras. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
• UAPx: An independent organization of scientists and academics that conducts field expeditions to monitor the skies using rigorous scientific methodology and curated sensor data. [1]
• SETI Institute: The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence has increasingly integrated UAP investigations into its broader data analysis, emphasizing the need for transparency, reproducible data, and independent verification. [1]

The Main Challenge
Despite the upward trend in researchers, scientists still face "boundary work"—with many facing professional ridicule, peer pushback, or hurdles regarding tenure. Researchers argue that to overcome this, the field must rely on wide-net, long-term monitoring and quantitative datasets rather than unverified eyewitness reports. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]
If you are interested, I can provide:

• More details on The Galileo Project's telescope network
• The findings from NASA's UAP Independent Study Team
• Peer-reviewed academic papers that touch on this phenomenon"

Also:

"The Data and Interest

• Academic Surveys: A major study published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communicationssurveyed nearly 40,000 tenured and tenure-track faculty across 144 U.S. universities. It found that 36% of academics expressed interest in conducting research into UAPs, and 37% considered further academic UAP research to be "very important" or "absolutely essential". [1, 2, 3]
• Prior Sightings: The same survey found that nearly 20% of respondents reported that they, or someone close to them, had personally observed something of unknown origin that fits the government's definition of a UAP. [1]"

 

[Stryder]

Is there a "UAP phenomenon" worth Studing?

First, some general perspectives:

For this response, I will take the perspective that what we mean as UAP phenomenon is really aliens or their technology near or on Earth. It might also include previously undocumented natural phenomenon that we have not yet found. I exclude distant life in other parts of the galaxy or beyond. I also exclude the uninteresting "unidentified" commonplace stuff.

It is not for you or I to decide what should be scientifically studied. Scientists will do this themselves. If something is interesting, then someone will study it. I don't buy the argument that scientists are afraid to do a study because of the stigma potentially attached to the area of study. It is true that scientists need funding and it may be difficult to get funding if there isn't a reasonable study design and the potential for interesting results. My opinion (which seems to be shared by many contributors here) is that so far there hasn't been a great deal of stuff to study and therefore no scientist has stepped up to the plate to study it. In adjacent fields of "is there life beyond Earth?", scientists have been studying this for decades. They don't seem to be bothered by stigma.

The scientific process requires that a hypothesis (at least one) is identified along with the null hypothesis. Once this is done, appropriate studies, tests, observations can be designed to reject the null hypothesis. If the null hypothesis is rejected at a sufficient (statistically speaking) level, then the scientist knows that they may be on to something and can devise further tests or revise the original hypothesis as needed. Fundamentally, if the hypothesis isn't falsifiable, then we aren't doing science. We can disprove a hypothesis, but it is exceedingly difficult to prove a hypothesis (most philosophers would say impossible).

As I've stated in in a previous thread on this topic, it is important to determine that there is something to study before spending effort on studying it. Besides the obvious issue of wasting time, effort, and money if there isn't something to study, we get into the "tooth fairy" issue. I believe the late Harriet Hall coined the term "Tooth Fairy Science". She said (and I am paraphrasing from memory, my apologies if I miss it a bit) that you could devise experiments about the tooth fairy such as analyzing the amount of money left by the tooth fairy over time or other factors that affect the amount of money left, but the results would be meaningless since you didn't start by ensuring the tooth fairy was a real phenomenon.

It is common when in the early stages of scientific discovery to conduct survey like efforts as part of developing hypothesis. The hypothesis being explored (possibly unstated) is something to the effect of "is there something here to study?" These surveys can be dedicated surveys or they can be collections of observations made over time by many people (not necessarily scientists). I would argue that UAP science is in the survey stage at best. Since there may in fact be nothing to study, it is prudent to minimize investment in time and money at this stage. Most (all?) of the data we have now on the subject of UAP is observational. Interestingly, we have a temporal set of observations that we can extract some information. Just two quick personal takeaways of these observations are: 1) they seem to be very tied to the gestalt of the time in history that they were made (i.e. we've moved from demons and angels, to nuts and bolts saucers, to orbs, to "plasmas"); 2) Even though our technology to observe and record observations has dramatically improved over the history of UAP phenomenon, we have not seen an improvement in the clarity of the observations. These taken together suggest that either the phenomenon is wholly artificial (e.g. Low Information Zone or social) or the real phenomenon is so subtle that we have just failed to capture evidence of it.

Now, what should we do? (again, "we" don't get to decide)

Without a doubt, there is fertile ground to study the sociological aspects of the UAP phenomenon. There is obviously something going on here, we have data, we could design experiments to collect more data, there are scientists that are probably interested in this. I don't know, but some of this has probably already been done. Studies of why people think what they think, how conspiracies arise, etc.

Another area that might be worth studying more is all around the neurological aspects of UAP perception. Why do people "see" UAPs. Lots of this ground has been covered both in general and specifically around UAPs.

On the topic of actually studying UAP themselves, I doubt that anyone (wealthy individual or government) is going to pony up the resources to exhaustively survey space, air, and water for the purpose of identifying UAPs as aliens. Our observations and coverage of these domains will continue to increase naturally over time due to other efforts. These include militaries defending nations, astronomers studying all things astronomical, searches in the ocean for missing ships or aircraft or resources, etc. Just the improvement in camera technology in the possession of consumers will increase the surveillance of our oceans and skies. The consumer grade IR cameras today are far better than the military grade sensors when I was working in the defence industry in the 1980s. If there is really something to UAPs, and people are "seeing" them, then it will show up eventually. I have serious doubts that this will ever happen, but I am open to evidence.

Finally, if any of the stories of crashed craft or recovered aliens is true, then it will leak. Scientific interest would grow fantastically if real physical evidence that stood up to scientific scrutiny came to light. All we need to have happen is one bit of true evidence to come out. The fact that it hasn't is not encouraging. It would take a very grand conspiracy to keep this stuff secret.

 

[Gary C]

Can UFOs, UAPs, etc. be studied scientifically? I'd argue they already are.

While reading the thread on the first data release from the War Dept and the comments from the Disclosure advocates, I started making notes on some of what we already know about UFOs, because so many cases have been solved.

A partial list of the known causes of UFO reports based on resolved UFO Cases

Physical objects in the LIZ

* Birds, commercial aircraft, drones
* New or unfamiliar military systems
* Optical effects caused by atmospheric conditions [e.g. temperature inversions]
* Meteorological events
* Artificial satellites
* Astronomical objects
* Naturally occurring meteors
* Spacecraft debris​

Technological Artefacts/System Noise

* Optical effects generated within the physical sensor/camera system
* Software compression artefacts in digital images/video
* Loss of fidelity/errors introduced in copying or transferring recorded data or media
* Instrument induced noise (e.g. spurious target from radar reflections)​

Observer Errors

* Neurologic/psychologic effects - e.g. Illusory triangles
* Estimation errors regarding nearby objects and events​

Speed
Distance
Size
Altitude
Direction of travel​

* Reporting errors - Mistranslations, inaccurate transcriptions, incorrect units used,
​

Sociological Noise

* Ad hoc fabrications - "Hey, this looks like a UFO in your school picture. Cool brah, crop us out of the shot and post it."
* Deliberate hoaxs
* Disinformation/Cover Story
* Social Contagion​

Only the first set of causes, those traceable to a physical objects at a non-trivial distance from the observer will be resolved by better optics, radar, FLIR, etc. Avi Loeb's Galileo Project might make some progress in this area. Perhaps such an effort would help head off the next drone panic. That would likely be worth at least some investment of public funds.

That still leaves a great deal of information space for anomalies to flourish in and I don't see disclosure advocates pushing for the sort of science or funding that would directly address the items lower on my list.

 

[Andreas]

It is not for you or I to decide what should be scientifically studied.

I agree - we have no right to dictate what scientists should study. Funding is certainly a factor, but researchers are generally free to choose their areas of interest. Through the democratic process, however, we can influence what receives public funding. Politicians can decide to support government-funded "UAP studies", and I'm sure many scientists would participate if a large, well funded, research program were established.

The problem is that politicians have often shown a poor understanding of the phenomenon itself—just look at the congressional hearings and the claims being made there. Public pressure can lead politicians to fund research that may not be worthwhile, and if the results fail to satisfy the loudest voices, there is a risk that the research agenda will simply be adjusted rather than the conclusions accepted.

As for stigma being the reason more UFO studies are not conducted, I'm not convinced. There is certainly some stigma attached to parts of the topic, but researchers who engage with it often receive considerable attention and support. Take Villarroel in Sweden as an example. She receives significant attention from both her employer and the public, who are intrigued by her claims. In many ways, she has become something of a scientific celebrity.

In the end, I think it is risky to adopt an overly open-minded approach by integrating UAP investigations into broader scientific initiatives such as SETI. More often than not, researchers will be working with misidentified birds, balloons, or cases of mass hysteria and assigning them undue significance. Even if a weak statistical correlation were found between, say, Villarroel's small dots and UAP sightings, it would not necessarily tell us anything meaningful. Yet such findings could still send researchers down the wrong path and lead to flawed conclusions.

 

[Nemon]

Personally, I see no reason to study the so-called "UAP phenomenon" scientifically, since I see no reason to believe such a phenomenon exists.

My take on this, rather brief: I fundamentally agree. That said, one has to clearly state where the boundaries lie. From a scientific perspective, it is difficult to justify conducting research based on an exo‑hypothesis whose statistical significance and plausibility effectively approach zero in an infinitesimal sense. At the same time, not every investigation is driven by such a hypothesis in the first place—often, the aim is simply to explain an observed phenomenon (that currently resides in the LIZ). The difference, however, does not lie in the phenomenon itself, but in the investigator: one introduces an exo‑hypothesis from the outset, while another deliberately refrains from doing so.

Attempting to explain observed phenomena may well be considered "debunking"—but debunking as a response presupposes the existence of bunk hypotheses in the first place. That quickly introduces bias, and we need to be cautious and honest with ourselves.

It is certainly not always easy to remain neutral and objective. Nevertheless, an unbiased, sober investigation of documented sightings—as advocated and, as far as possible, practiced here—is important. Not in the strict scientific sense, because, as mentioned, there is no genuinely compelling reason for that. But as a form of pre‑selection or a preliminary stage to scientific analysis, it is acceptable and often quite important, in my view. And each time, we learn something about our perception, about physical phenomena, and so on. So it's a valuable process. Everyone should take away learnings what is not actually the case. The transition, however, is fluid, since laboratory studies—and likely also SITREC visualizations—are themselves part of a scientific toolkit.

Perhaps nothing illustrates how delicate and nuanced all this can be better than the Hessdalen phenomenon, which has occured and still occurs under in‑situ scientific observation yet still defies explanation afaik. A comparable case is ball lightning.

In these instances, there does appear to be a valid and statistically significant reason to conduct serious research and develop hypotheses. Where, then, lies the difference compared to someone like, let's say Avi Loeb? To me, this seems so obvious that I hardly need to formulate the thought to its conclusion.

 

[Harabeck]

FWIW, the magic 8 ball Google AI.
Survey says!:

...

Can we not? If you want to use such a query as the starting point for your reply, that's fine. But just pasting that stuff into the thread is a waste of space. I think the mainly relevant part to this was that scientific interest in the topic is on the rise. I'd much prefer if you looked through the sources the google reply cited and figure out which of those are most relevant to that point and cite that. I think it might have been this jpost link?

 

[Andreas]

In these instances, there does appear to be a valid and statistically significant reason to conduct serious research and develop hypotheses. Where, then, lies the difference compared to someone like, let's say Avi Loeb? To me, this seems so obvious that I hardly need to formulate the thought to its conclusion.

Basically, I agree with everything you're saying.

The problem is not studying unidentified phenomena; it's studying phenomena for which there is no evidence of existence. And doing so because the "public" demand such studies. When people argue for a "scientific investigation of UAPs," it often implies that such a phenomenon exists. As a result, the studies themselves can end up lending credibility to extraordinary claims. Some even argue that if scientists are studying it, it must be real.

Hessdalen is a good example, as you mentioned. Is there a genuine yet unexplained natural phenomenon occurring there? Possibly. But the area has also become a hotspot for UFO enthusiasts, and most reported sightings can likely be explained by mundane causes such as astronomical objects, lanterns, or reflections. This mirrors the UFO phenomenon in general: if people spend enough time looking for extraordinary things, they will eventually accumulate a number of difficult-to-explain cases. Those cases are then used to justify further study of the supposed "phenomenon", whether we're talking about UFOs, ghosts, or lake monsters. If scientists find evidence of a genuine anomalous phenomenon in the Norwegian valley, then it's definitely worth studying. But lumping together a large number of sightings, combining folklore, science, hoaxes, and misinterpretations, and then using these as a reason to study the "phenomenon" isn't the way to go.

My main objection to studying the "UAP phenomenon" is therefore that I don't think there is a well defined phenomenon to study. We can study how to distinguish birds from drones on infrared imagery, build better FLIR systems, or investigate whether even trained observers can be misled by psychological factors. But "UAPs" themselves are not a coherent subject of study. Better cameras will undoubtedly identify some unknown objects, but they will also reveal new unidentified ones farther away and with even less data available.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

If we look at those who applied the most rigorous scientific methodology to the phenomenon, such as GEIPAN, CISU, Project Blue Book, and the COMETA report, the professionals who actually conducted these investigations consistently conclude that a residual percentage of cases stubbornly resists any conventional explanation. (According to them).
We might disagree on whether this residue contains something truly groundbreaking. However, from my perspective, if NASA, Villarroel, or other scientists decide to narrow their focus down to these specific high-quality anomalies, cross-reference their data, and map out common technosignatures or physical patterns to look for, I see absolutely no scientific objection to that.
Now if the programs I cited were wrong in their conclusion, it would be awesome to have that cleared by better organized teams and studies.
Of course scientists do not need me to tell them what to study, I'm no one.
But I think we are starting to see a shift, which will not prove aliens, but possibly get us some more known answers, even just better "eyes" to identify random stuff that gets misinterpreted.
That's how I see it.

 

[Nourali]

There are two issues in one here that I think are worth separating in order to frame the debate more clearly.

First, evidence in science is not always binary. It is not necessarily just "proven" or "nothing at all." It may be more useful to think of evidence as a spectrum, with different degrees of confidence between something being well established and something being reasonably dismissed.

That seems to be where much of the UAP debate takes place. More skeptical people may think the evidence for genuinely anomalous objects is very weak, and that ordinary explanations are likely. Others may agree that no anomalous phenomenon has been scientifically proven, while still thinking that some weird unresolved cases make the question worth investigating further with better data.

So, in my view, the point of studying UAPs is not necessarily to assume that an exotic phenomenon already exists. It is more about trying to determine whether any genuinely anomalous cases exist at all, and whether better data collection could help move the discussion out of its current grey area.

Of course, there is also the problem that if there is nothing there, proving non-existence is extremely difficult. But one could argue that if, over time, better resources and better studies produce nothing new, or if the strongest (opinion) cases such as Nimitz or others are eventually resolved, then it would become more reasonable to think that further investment may not be justified.

So maybe the central question is whether the current state of evidence is enough to justify more serious investigation.

 

[Nourali]

If there is really something to UAPs, and people are "seeing" them, then it will show up eventually.

I agree, 100%.

Regarding alleged alien crash or close-encounter cases, such as Varginha or the Ariel School incident, we can understand why there may be no video evidence: these events allegedly happened in the 1990s, when people did not routinely carry cameras in their pockets.
However, given the number of alleged cases of this kind, it seems reasonable to expect that if such events are real, something similar could eventually happen again. And today, unlike in the 1990s, such an event would be far more likely to be recorded from multiple angles, with phones, CCTV, dashcams, or other sensors.
The lack of video from older cases is not necessarily decisive against them. But if, over the coming decades, no comparable event is ever recorded despite the ubiquity of cameras and sensors, that would become a very strong reason to say that such events did not actually happened.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

I'm willing to dump it in the laps of the True Believers for now. I disbelieve there to be any inter-stellar component or non-human entity behind the sightings which get the UFOlogists all a-twitter, and that s true for the "anomalous" (unidentified) things as well as the ones we can identify. But, like any good scientist, I'm willing to revisit my beliefs IF AND WHEN some credible evidence surfaces. It's just not my job to dig it out, and that's the thing I'll cheerfully leave to those who make the claims.

I have friends who do scientific research who do not look into it because they are uninterested, and 99% rightfully so.
There are others who still entertain the possibility that someone should study those things as well (aerial anomalies in general), but won't do so for various reasons (mind you some of it is stigma, but also that they care for other stuff much more).
Just to clarify that in my other posts in the previous thread, my position never was, and never will be "lazy scientists do not take it seriously! This is an issue".
I actually think we are seeing a little change on that, in the current times.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

I agree, 100%.

Regarding alleged alien crash or close-encounter cases, such as Varginha or the Ariel School incident, we can understand why there may be no video evidence: these events allegedly happened in the 1990s, when people did not routinely carry cameras in their pockets.
However, given the number of alleged cases of this kind, it seems reasonable to expect that if such events are real, something similar could eventually happen again. And today, unlike in the 1990s, such an event would be far more likely to be recorded from multiple angles, with phones, CCTV, dashcams, or other sensors.
The lack of video from older cases is not necessarily decisive against them. But if, over the coming decades, no comparable event is ever recorded despite the ubiquity of cameras and sensors, that would become a very strong reason to say that such events did not actually happened.

Yeah but this "assumes" that even those cases are anomalous but many here think they are not.
I also have no idea on the Ariel case but that's for its specific thread.
When we have pilots and radar systems malfunctions, it could be just errors, and only that, but who knows 100%?
That's my take.

 

[flarkey]

First, evidence in science is not always binary.

Evidence may not be binary, but existence is. Either something exists or it doesn't. So the spectrum and the available weight of evidence points to a binary conclusion. Before working out what something is we need to determine if it exists or not, and I don't think we're over the binary line of being able to say that some new, physical phenomenon has been confirmed to exist yet. This needs to be shown before we can work out what it is.

 

[Todd Feinman]

Evidence may not be binary, but existence is. Either something exists or it doesn't. So the spectrum and the available weight of evidence points to a binary conclusion. Before working out what something is we need to determine if it exists or not, and I don't think we're over the binary line of being able to say that some new, physical phenomenon has been confirmed to exist yet. This needs to be shown before we can work out what it is.

Yes, that's the first step.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

The lack of video from older cases is not necessarily decisive against them. But if, over the coming decades, no comparable event is ever recorded despite the ubiquity of cameras and sensors, that would become a very strong reason to say that such events did not actually happened.

I actually agree.
If there really are those cases of something landing somewhere and leaving traces on the ground (Zamora like), the idea of an occurrence like this being studied by serious scientists is better than to leave it to UFO buffs to speculate.
There still ARE people who do these things.
Many times it's either the military (which does not do open science for obvious reasons. What if it really was an advanced foreign drone?) or volunteers which can do good science also, but whose resources are limited.
If there is nothing at all, there still might potentially be new interesting psychological phenomena yet to be properly documented, and I would be fine with any results.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

Evidence may not be binary, but existence is. Either something exists or it doesn't. So the spectrum and the available weight of evidence points to a binary conclusion. Before working out what something is we need to determine if it exists or not, and I don't think we're over the binary line of being able to say that some new, physical phenomenon has been confirmed to exist yet. This needs to be shown before we can work out what it is.

The "rare anomalies" exist and are reported.
Even if in the end it's just mistakes.

Whether they are aliens or not is another matter entirely in my view.

 

[Nourali]

if any of the stories of crashed craft or recovered aliens is true, then it will leak. Scientific interest would grow fantastically if real physical evidence that stood up to scientific scrutiny came to light. All we need to have happen is one bit of true evidence to come out. The fact that it hasn't is not encouraging. It would take a very grand conspiracy to keep this stuff secret.

I agree that if crash-retrieval stories are true, we should expect leaks. But maybe that is exactly what whistleblower claims are: leaks, just not the strongest kind yet.
A leak does not necessarily mean someone walking out with alien metal or a body. It can start with people talking, documents, testimony, rumors inside the system, etc. And with compartmentalized programs, people may only know fragments, not enough to prove the whole thing publicly.

So I think the argument works more as a long-term test. If this is real, we should expect stronger evidence to emerge over time.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

I just don't get the impression from all this that "there's no direction, nothing to even think of studying".
But I don't know more than you do.

 

[Nourali]

Evidence may not be binary, but existence is. Either something exists or it doesn't. So the spectrum and the available weight of evidence points to a binary conclusion. Before working out what something is we need to determine if it exists or not, and I don't think we're over the binary line of being able to say that some new, physical phenomenon has been confirmed to exist yet. This needs to be shown before we can work out what it is.

The evidence can be insufficient to confirm the existence of a new phenomenon, while still being enough to justify better investigation.

 

[Todd Feinman]

Does it matter if scientists study it or not?
I'm not sure. These things have been reported for a long time.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

Does it matter if scientists study it or not?
I'm not sure. These things have been reported for a long time.

With current technology, and more open data that can be shared and reviewed by others?
Probably yes, it does matter in my view.

 

[Todd Feinman]

With current technology, and more open data that can be shared and reviewed by others?
Probably yes, it does matter in my view.

Don't can be weaponized? Used for more human technology?

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

And I wouldn't accept any BS "oh well we have interesting cases but, you know, security".
Of course, I suck it up already, but if science has to be done…

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

Don't can be weaponized? Used for more human technology?

I think this they do already.

 

[Todd Feinman]

I think this they do already.

Right. Behold the mess we are in. It'll show up if it exists. If it does and scientists can't study it, that's alright. If it's not our scientists that would abuse it, it would be another country's. Just doing research. If it is smarter than we are, it might not want to be studied. We can already basically destroy the planet, what the heck else do we want?

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

Right. Behold the mess we are in. It'll show up if it exists. If it does and scientists can't study it, that's alright. If it's not our scientists that would abuse it, it would be another country's. Just doing research. If it is smarter than we are, it might not want to be studied.

If it's sentient, surely won't show up in front of Avi!
(Jk)

 

[Todd Feinman]

If it's sentient, surely won't show up in front of Avi!
(Jk)

There might even be good reasons to keep it secret. From what I've seen and from others. I do believe we wouldn't be here if it wanted to do us in. Just my opinion. And scientists are studying it. They just disagree with each other. I'm beginning to think disclosure is a bad idea and scientists should turn their attention to other things.
Any other type of contact or disclosure, and the world would be in chaos. I'm against "Disclosure" I'm for gradual fleeting contact. Watch the news. We are too stupid. Stupid.
Think more moves ahead.

 

[Gaspa]

This discussion came up in another thread, and I want to continue it here. Personally, I see no reason to study the so-called "UAP phenomenon" scientifically, since I see no reason to believe such a phenomenon exists. To me, UAPs only exist in the LIZ, and not even better equipment will help us, since it will only move the "phenomenon" further into the distance. When people claim we should conduct more scientific studies on UAPs, I'm personally confused about what that even means.

It might sound like a reasonable demand. We want to know what those blurry videos actually show and what the "whistleblowers" are actually talking about, don't we? But when people make such demands, it's often implied that the "UAP phenomenon" is something anomalous—something strange that has been kept secret from the public. The sad truth, however, is that after seeing piles of videos, we still have no real reason to believe that's the case.

To me, the role of a skeptic should be quite passive. It is important to react to the videos that are released and to comment on the claims being made. But I will never demand more material showing "strange stuff." I will never stand on the barricades demanding more data and more information. If it looks like a pig, walks like a pig, and smells like a pig, then it's probably a pig. I don't need additional data confirming that it's actually a pig. Someone claiming it's a cow will need to provide the evidence themselves.

Not wanting to spend government dollars and scientists' time studying a phenomenon that has not been confirmed to be real seems to be an extreme opinion nowadays. But that's my humble opinion, and I'm happy to be challenged on it.

On one hand, I think I get your point and it makes complete sense.
A UAP or UFO, by definition, is something that we don't have enough enough information to find out what it is, and it can be a huge variety of different things. So how could a there be a scientific field that tries to cover a variety of different possible phenomena from insufficient information?

But... Look at what has already been achieved, here, on metabunk. The tools developed (mostly by Mick, I guess), the skillset this group of people has honed, and especially the number of solved cases. Sometimes the information needed to do the identification was there all along, like in some of the Pentagon videos, it just required someone with the right skills, tools and motivation, and (and time) to do the job. And in so many others it required finding more information, some sleuthing, I guess, and then the UFO leaves the LIZ and becomes an Identified, maybe not even flying, thing. It might not fit most definitions of a Scientific investigation, but in the sense that it Finds Things Out, it very much is Science, which just means Knowledge.

BTW, another good point raised on this post, if I may paraphrase, is that the claim that "A in UAP stands for Anomalous" is a complete misnomer, and I think it needs more pushback. As if there was something "anomalous" about a blurry spot moving out of focus in a video. Just No. Call it aerial. Or call it something else and change the acronym again. But accepting the "anomaly" label is already giving up ground that they didn't conquer.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

BTW, another good point raised on this post, if I may paraphrase, is that the claim that "A in UAP stands for Anomalous" is a complete misnomer, and I think it needs more pushback. As if there was something "anomalous" about a blurry spot moving out of focus in a video. Just No. Call it aerial. Or call it something else and change the acronym again. But accepting the "anomaly" label is already giving up ground that they didn't conquer.

I do not refer to AARO alone.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

On one hand, I think I get your point and it makes complete sense.
A UAP or UFO, by definition, is something that we don't have enough enough information to find out what it is, and it can be a huge variety of different things. So how could a there be a scientific field that tries to cover a variety of different possible phenomena from insufficient information?

But... Look at what has already been achieved, here, on metabunk. The tools developed (mostly by Mick, I guess), the skillset this group of people has honed, and especially the number of solved cases. Sometimes the information needed to do the identification was there all along, like in some of the Pentagon videos, it just required someone with the right skills, tools and motivation, and (and time) to do the job. And in so many others it required finding more information, some sleuthing, I guess, and then the UFO leaves the LIZ and becomes an Identified, maybe not even flying, thing. It might not fit most definitions of a Scientific investigation, but in the sense that it Finds Things Out, it very much is Science, which just means Knowledge.

100% agree

 

[flarkey]

Right. Behold the mess we are in. It'll show up if it exists. If it does and scientists can't study it, that's alright. If it's not our scientists that would abuse it, it would be another country's. Just doing research. If it is smarter than we are, it might not want to be studied.

"If it is smarter than we are, it might not want to be studied." - and therein lies a major issue. The hypothesis that a UAP phenomenon exists is unfalsifiable because it can always be said that they have more intelligence and better technology than us so that makes them undetectable.

Checkmate debunkers!

 

[Todd Feinman]

"If it is smarter than we are, it might not want to be studied." - and therein lies a major issue. The hypothesis that a UAP phenomenon exists is unfalsifiable because it can always be said that they have more intelligence and better technology than us so that makes them undetectable.

Checkmate debunkers!

Sure, but it might also be the case. I think the frustration you all are having is that there is very little to no physical evidence to study with hard sciences. Maybe let it percolate in sociology for a while. And if a big mass sighting occurs, you can adjust your perspectives.

 

[Mendel]

UAP reports can be studied. But commissions have established 50 years ago that there is little scientific value in it.⁴

However much the believers claim otherwise, a UAP phenomenon has not been shown to exist¹. There is no set of characteristics that define it. The closest we've come is the "5 observables" (which have since morphed into 6?)² which basically say, "this is what a UAP must look like, otherwise it's already as good as debunked". But these criteria boil down to "an actual UAP must contradict the laws of physics", and that's a foregone conclusion: not going to happen.

What we do have is a consistent lack of data that prevents identification. If you film something with your camera (or any other sensor) that is moving away from you, at some point it's going to be so far that you couldn't identify it any more if you didn't already know what it was. We have either clear data on something we know, or insufficient data on something we don't know. That doesn't make the latter special, it's just in the low information zone, the LIZ.

---

¹ https://www.metabunk.org/threads/science-if-bigfoot-is-there-it-could-be-a-bear.13328/post-325757
² https://www.metabunk.org/threads/ne...iddle-east-red-balloon-2024.14243/post-346114
³ https://www.metabunk.org/threads/ufo-acronyms-what-is-the-liz.11742/
⁴ e.g. the Condon report, see https://www.metabunk.org/threads/aaros-historical-uap-report-volume-1.13375/post-312123 for a quote

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

"If it is smarter than we are, it might not want to be studied." - and therein lies a major issue. The hypothesis that a UAP phenomenon exists is unfalsifiable because it can always be said that they have more intelligence and better technology than us so that makes them undetectable.

Checkmate debunkers!

my opinion on that is that anomalies do not have to be anything intelligent at all without knowing.

 

[Todd Feinman]

Then don't study it. Case closed! Focus on debunking airborne clutter and Mylar balloons. We need to clear that stuff up anyway so we don't mistake it for adversaries as the CIA was concerned with so long ago. There is no evidence for you to study. Close up observers are lying or mistaken. I'm okay with all of it. I'm deadly serious about not wanting scientists to get ahold of this stuff. They also make biological weapons, hypersonic missiles, drill for oil, etc. etc. Work on cleaning up the mess you have helped to create, already. BUT, I don't want my tax money going to scientists trying to weapons whatever it is in the government. CUT off their funding. Make sure they are NOT studying it, Dagnabit.

 

[flarkey]

my opinion on that is that anomalies do not have to be anything intelligent at all without knowing.

So therefore they should be detectable - repeatedly, predicably and objectively. And therefore if they are not detected then we could postulate that absence of evidence is, in that case, evidence of absence , ie non-existence. (Probably).