> The whole debate of UFO's generally misses the important question, and
The
> Question is not 'Have we been visited by an extraterrestrial
civilization?'
> but 'Why have we been visited by extraterrestrial civilizations?'
>How can you even ask the second question if you don't know that the first
>is true?
It doesn't matter if the first is true. There would have to be a reason
for travelling between solar systems before it would be done. This will or
has been the reason(s) 'WE' will do it.
> 'We' send out probes to other planets...why wouldn't another
> planet's intelligent life?
>Which planet's intelligent life?
Any planet's intelligent life.
> First, the Air Force's 'mogul' explanation's biggest problem for me is
the
> amount of material found (supposedly scattered for over a quarter of a
> mile).
>And who, exactly, claimed it was scattered over quarter of a mile? I
don't
>have access to original documents, but I do have a cite for the
>_Alberquerque Journal_, July 9 1947 claiming that the recovered object
was
>about three feet across... Hmm, odd, that's around about the size of the
>Mogul balloon's payload, isn't it? Bet it's just one of them coincidences.
I *THINK* I read that as a quote from the official Air Force release (the
first one, not the contraction). It of course could be bogus.
> Second, the Air Force has yet to explain the extreme security measures it
> took to recover and dispose of this 'balloon'. Even if it was a top
secret
> spy device a simple gathering of the wreckage of a 'weather balloon' and
an
> embarrassing apology for releasing a false report ('We have recovered a
> flying saucer') would have sufficed.
>It's a black program, or the 40s equivalent; indeed, as far as I'm aware
>it was part of the nuclear development programs (checking for radioactive
>fallout from Russian bombs), and hence security would have been
incredibly
>tight. What do you expect them to do?
Which brings up the question again...why weren't they actively searching
for it?
>BTW, you do realise that New Mexico was in the middle of a spate of
>'flying disc' reports, don't you? Someone's collected together nine
>newspaper reports of 'flying discs' from July 1st to July 11th, several
of
>which were either parts of weather balloons or hoaxes. Don't you think
>that in the circumstances it's not entirely surprising that that's how it
>was first reported? I mean, after all, that's pretty much what the
>balloon's payload looked like.
I personally don't believe the skies are full of aliens. I do believe
aliens have visited. May have been a million years ago or 100000 or 50 or
just last week. I'm not a 'beam me up I love aliens' fanatic. I do know
the government can lie. That's what pisses me off.
>Finally, how come no reference to aliens at Roswell was ever made
>publically until more than thirty years later?
I remember reading a book back in the 60's about Roswell that talked of
captured aliens. Dunno how many others before then. I'm not a devotee of
UFO's.
-drl
david_laws@nih.gov