Headlines filled with news of falling currencies and gilts have obscured other (other)worldly developments.
We at The Blind Spot aim to redress these ills.
On September 27, a US intelligence agency, the National Intelligence Manager for Aviation, posted a logo on its website that included a flying saucer. This tongue-in-cheek sketch was quickly erased once images of the logo below went viral.
A day later, the Black Vault released a large cache of NASA emails regarding communications on the topic of Unidentified Aerial/Anomalous Phenomena. These included high-level internal discussions on things like ‘extreme acceleration’ and techno signature research. NASA officials also circulated criticism of the landmark Condon Report – the report that finally condemned UAP research to the scientific bin in 1968. These officials call the report, which allegedly found no evidence of anything extraordinary in UAP sightings, as unscientific.
Unless you are living under a rock, the problem of UAP is real. They may genuinely represent a threat to national security. They could make us question the very nature of our existence. Serious political people, scientists and media are now beginning to openly share their interests in the subject.
This leaves you, Blind Spot reader, in dear need of necessary information to navigate the complex web of theories regarding UAP. Because, as it stands, UAP theories are not a question of ‘it’s aliens’ versus ‘it’s misidentified clouds’.
Traditionally, this debate was meted out by wily-haired freaks mumbling about aliens or overconfident gray-matter-light ‘scientists’ quick to dismiss any prima facie evidence they disagreed with.
A little like this:
Unsurprisingly, they’re both likely wrong.
With this common misconception out of the way, what if we told you of a secret key to decipher the swamp of UAP theories?
And that it’s not as complicated as you think?
(I have left interesting stories in most hyperlinks. Peruse to your liking.)
Hypotheses for UAP are a matter of controversy and differ widely even in the nerdiest of UAP circles.
Traditionally, these debates lead the novice interested in UAP to exhaustion.
But The Blind Spot seeks to offer a handy explanation to square the root of these disagreements.
The key is Occam’s razor;
The simplest explanation for a given problem is more likely to be true.
However, when speaking of UAP, few agree on what is the given problem!
Anomalous phenomena bridge a wide range of manifestations without concrete explanations. Some of these are;
- UAP sightings
- So-called ‘alien’ abductions
- Crop circles
- Cattle mutilations
Often referencing each other, some of the cases above share similar themes. For instance, UAP sightings can be reported in similar locations and times as crop circles or cattle mutilations – and these often occur in ‘waves’ or ‘flaps’ similar to UAP.
This overlap means UAP explanations will have difficulty addressing just one anomalous problem in a vacuum. A proper explanation should therefore be simple and yet hold explanatory power for the highest number of case categories. In other words, the explanatory net should be cast wide and remain porous – with the explanation remaining as simple as possible.
Ranking hypotheses not by simplicity, but by degree of far-reaching explanatory power (based on the number of anomalous phenomena under study) thus provides a clearer view of the UAP field.
Natural Phenomena Hypothesis
The average proponent:
Sample size:
- Mostly restricted to a biased selection of UAP sightings that are clearly explainable via conventional explanatory means.
Explanation:
- Each and every single UAP sighting can be explained via mundane natural or man-made phenomena.
Issues:
- Unwavering close-mindedness and dismissal of any evidence to the contrary (that is, most evidence).
Man-Made Hypothesis
The average proponent:
Sample size:
- UAP sightings as a whole.
- Occasionally, man-made hypotheses proponents also include a limited sample of ‘alien’ abduction, crop circle, and cattle mutilation cases.
Explanation:
- Genuinely ‘out-there’ UAP sightings that aren’t natural phenomena can be explained via modern US or any other independent agency’s ‘black’ programmes.
- When including ‘alien’ abduction, crop circle, and cattle mutilation cases, these are labeled as either spooky Mengele-style research programs cloaking as alien intervention, or psychological warfare programs.
Issues:
- Analyses UAP sightings in isolation – cannot account for historic sightings.
Extra/Intraterrestrial Hypothesis
The average proponent:
Sample size:
- Non-comparative analysis of UAP sightings, ‘alien’ abduction, crop circle, and cattle mutilation case.
Explanation:
- Genuine UAP sightings, abductions, and mutilations which cannot be explained via the man-made or natural phenomena hypothesis mean an interstellar, intra-terrestrial, or oceanic species is responsible for this engagement with humans.
Issues:
- Taking UAP sightings, abduction, crop circle, and mutilation phenomena at both face value and in historical isolation.
Interdimensional / Crypto Control System Hypothesis
The average proponent:
Sample size:
Explanation:
- Genuine UAP sightings, abductions, and mutilations are the modern iteration of ancient myths of deities, angels, or medieval myths of folklore and Marian apparitions.
- The hypothesis, penned by Jacques Vallee, is also dubbed the Occult Control System hypothesis; Vallee speculated these historically consistent, zeitgeist-adapting apparitions represented a symbols-based governance mechanism directed at creating grassroots movements and beliefs that shape human history, originating from an unknown power (an unknown power that Vallee stays away from speculating on).
Issues:
- Non-falsifiable, and implies that any attempt to resolve the Phenomenon will meet the dead-end imposed by our current zeitgeist.
The above agree on few things; all serious proponents of UAP hypotheses concur on the relative rarity of ‘genuinely’ anomalous cases vis-a-vis reported cases. The importance of quickly analysing any reported case for the probability of a mundane explanation is any UFOlogist’s first priority, whether a rabid interdimensionalist or extraterrestrialist.
Critically, they all insist on treating the UAP problem seriously. Even diehard natural phenomenon enthusiasts like Neil DeGrasse Tyson would insist that since UAP are innocuous, only further study will clarify the issue once and for all.
But even DeGrasse Tyson has been evolving his public views on the topic. As he noted in a recent Wall Street Journal story:
Another cosmic revelation that could change humanity’s self-understanding is the discovery that we are not alone in the universe. This could signal a change in the human condition that we cannot foresee or imagine. Taken to enticing yet frightening limits, we might exist in a computer simulation programmed by intelligent juvenile aliens still living in their parents’ basement. Or we might discover that planet Earth is a zoo—a literal terrarium and aquarium, constructed for the amusement of alien anthropologists. Perhaps our cosmos, complete with our hundred billion stars per galaxy and the hundred billion galaxies in the observable universe, is nothing more than a snow globe on some alien creature’s mantel.
In these scenarios, the cosmic perspective morphs from the universe reminding us to become better shepherds of our own fate to the universe declaring that we’re playthings for high-level life-forms. A terrifying prospect, perhaps. But we take better care of our cats and dogs than we do of homeless humans in the street. If we serve as pets to aliens, might they take better care of us than we ever will of ourselves?
Perhaps, then, the most ideal hypotheses gels with our own view;
The Blind Spot View
The average proponent:
Sample size:
- Everything and anything, prioritising cases that challenge our current understanding of the world.
Explanation:
- Explanation-neutral; we must be single-minded in the pursual of additional data-collection methods, with promises of funding and respectability attracting smart & serious minds to the topic.
Issues:
- We’re behind on schedule.
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