Are UFOs & Ufology In Decline? If So—Why?

[Xanatic*]

Mutilating cows even after they've been turned into burgers, that is taking it a bit too far.

 

[kamalktk]

On the subject of whether or not ufology is really dead, I've noticed that Coast To Coast AM (a long-running radio show covering the paranormal, conspiracy theories and whatnot) has increased their UFO coverage significantly of late. They always have covered UFOs, but it seems recently they have a round-up of weekly sightings on some broadcasts (much like a weather or traffic report. )

Maybe ufology is in for a renaissance?

Their UFO weather report unfortunately seems to consist of not so much more than the ol' "orange lights in the sky". I think it's actually a disservice that they bother to talk about what are such easily written off sightings. I'd rather see a once in a while in depth discussion of a single good sighting.

 

[Analogue Boy]

...Or maybe lower your expectations.

 

[Graylien]

Coast to Coast seem to buy into the whole exopolitics scene quite heavily. It's a fun listen, but there doesn't seem to be much critical thinking involved.

 

[Ulalume]

Arrgh. I'm going to have to do the thing I hate the most and disagree. (oh, how I hate being controversial )

Their UFO weather report unfortunately seems to consist of not so much more than the ol' "orange lights in the sky". I think it's actually a disservice that they bother to talk about what are such easily written off sightings. I'd rather see a once in a while in depth discussion of a single good sighting.

From my point of view, I doubt there's ever going to be any UFO report that won't be summarily dismissed by skeptics, outside of an admission by NASA or similar (and even then, that's debatable). Even when they report on things that are more solid, evidence-wise, such things fail to gain scientific credibiltiy. Given that, I appreciate the acknowledgement of reports from the Average Joe who saw some strange lights in the sky over Indiana. I see it as sort of a grab bag which people can sift through to make their own decisions and investigations, as they see fit.

Basically, I think it's better that the information is there, than not. Plus, other people who saw the same thing might find out about the other sightings, since it's not as if they are likely to report this on the nightly news.

Just as a barometer of interest in UFO's, it might be telling.

Coast to Coast seem to buy into the whole exopolitics scene quite heavily. It's a fun listen, but there doesn't seem to be much critical thinking involved.

Since Coast to Coast is meant to be (according to Art Bell when he began it) an open forum for people to discuss the paranormal without ridicule, they have a policy of not challenging their guests or callers. Thus, you can get something credible one night and something utterly whackadoodle bonkers the next, neither of which gets much argument.

I'm unsure if the program itself supports any particular view over another. When I've tried to look into this, all that popped up were loads of conspiracy therories - unsuprisingly, perhaps - so I really don't know. It seems all over the place to me. It's entirely possible they have more guests who support exopolitics because these get higher ratings.

Regardless, I still enjoy settling down with a pot of tea and listening to the show late at night. The show doesn't think critically, but I do, so it's fine with me.

 

[Graylien]

Well, Dr David Jacobs is still going strong. Here he is on the Conflict Paracast podcast talking about his new book: Walking Among Us: The Alien Plan to Control Humanity. (The adverts are most annoying, but it's a fairly entertaining interview. Jacobs comes across as a very affable chap.)

The good doctor seems to have invented a new term "hubrids" to describe human-looking alien hybrids who are now colonising the Earth and can control us with their minds. He's pressed on why he hasn't made more effort to gather physical evidence of abductions and doesn't really have a satisfactory answer. (Nor does he explain how these hubrids are managing to rent apartments having presumably beamed down to Earth with no ID or money.)

I haven't come across this podcast before, but I think it's going to replace Coast to Coast AM as my night time listening when insomnia strikes.

 

[kamalktk]

I haven't come across this podcast before, but I think it's going to replace Coast to Coast AM as my night time listening when insomnia strikes.

I like them better than Coast to Coast, but the Paracast only has one episode a week. Dr David Jacobs was also on Art Bell's Midnight in the Desert show discussing this book. Dr Jacobs does a pretty solid job of talking about the contents of his book. Sometimes you listen to author interviews and you can tell why they are authors and not speakers.

 

[GNC]

I read one of Jacobs' books called... Visitors? Intruders? Something like that, and it was page after page of accounts recovered under hypnosis, which could have been anything and he's known for asking leading questions under those conditions. Quite an entertaining read, but it might as well have been sci-fi.

 

[JamesWhitehead]

Reading the title of the thread again, I found myself drifting back to the days when UFO-enthusiasts used to gather in the upstairs-rooms of pubs all over the country . . .

Well no, I didn't. Maybe I was late for the party or I didn't read the right notice-boards. I'm not saying I would have gone but I would have been curious. Same went for a lot of meetings . . .

So what was the nature and extent of the UFO-subculture in pre-internet days? We know it isn't what it was but what was it? And when was it? Where was it? Any survivors of it?

 

[GNC]

BUFORA, Flying Saucer Review, fanzine clippings culture, the odd hardy soul on a field trip... those were the days.

 

[Ulalume]

And don't forget MUFON, the Mutual UFO Network
http://www.mufon.com/

For years, the MUFON headquarters was in the next town over from ours. Not quite upstairs above a pub, but it was located in a strip mall. You knew it by the spaceship on the sign.
Their headquarters have moved, but I'm glad to hear they're still kicking.

ETA - I've just had a look through their website, and it is a thing of beauty. OKay, at least to me it is. (I understand other people might not necessarily agree.)

 

[Coal]

And don't forget MUFON, the Mutual UFO Network
http://www.mufon.com/

For years, the MUFON headquarters was in the next town over from ours. Not quite upstairs above a pub, but it was located in a strip mall. You knew it by the spaceship on the sign.
Their headquarters have moved, but I'm glad to hear they're still kicking.

ETA - I've just had a look through their website, and it is a thing of beauty. OKay, at least to me it is. (I understand other people might not necessarily agree.)

They have a 'live UFO map'. Great fun, worth a visit.

 

[Ulalume]

They have a 'live UFO map'. Great fun, worth a visit.

The "UFO Stalker". Neat!
http://www.ufostalker.com/?mufon=true
I'm such a nerd about maps, and a UFO map? Even better.

 

[rynner2]

The "UFO Stalker". Neat!
http://www.ufostalker.com/?mufon=true
I'm such a nerd about maps, and a UFO map? Even better.

The maps cover UK and Europe as well.

But note that the date format is American, ie, 08/11/2015 11:00 UTC is 11th August 2015.
(UTC is effectively GMT, so add an hour for BST when appropriate.)

 

[kamalktk]

Since the forum has a preference for resurrection rather than conception when it comes to threads, I append this post accordingly. My search for any previous FTMB comment upon Stella Lansing seems only to unearth the short mention hereinwith.

So do we know much of her? I commend this rather-interesting multi-topic video for your jaundiced but ever-hopeful consideration.

I found the same video. There's not a whole lot out there on Stella, the link below was maybe the best I could find.

http://www.ghosttheory.com/2015/11/02/stella-lansing-photographs-from-beyond

 

[Shady]

The "UFO Stalker". Neat!
http://www.ufostalker.com/?mufon=true
I'm such a nerd about maps, and a UFO map? Even better.

cool, found two only a mile away from me, thanks Ulalume

 

[charliebrown]

Roswell and all of Ufology are dead

The Pentagon says there is not enough data to consider UFOs and aliens.

Just recently rumors that the newly formed Space Force feels like it is degrading to search for UFOs.

Just recently Arizona Rep. Ruben Gallego has found evidence that security government agencies have gone back to their old ways of trashing UFO information.

I have read internet opinions that people who are interested in UFOs are growing old and dying out.

Younger people are not interested.

We need a UFO to just land in a crowded street.

 

[Trevp666]

We need a UFO to just land in a crowded street.

Nobody would notice it. All too busy looking at their phones.

 

[Kondoru]

That would be terribly unsafe.

 

[Ringo]

We need a UFO to just land in a crowded street.

There is a famous Swedish UFO case involving a Gideon Johansson.

To begin with, he claims to have witnessed in July 1958, along with his cousin and cousin's daughter, a craft approx. 75-100 metres long in the late evening sky. Various other people saw it too with varying descriptions: a red rocket, a green meteorite, a blue flying saucer etc.

Johansson then claims that 15 months later, on the 29th or 30th september 1959 (other sources say 29th or 30th october) that he and his son witnessed a craft land on a main street during a blackout experienced by the whole town of Mariannelund. A strange light had appeared in the sky over the local community centre and lots of people saw it. Gideon claims that the light came lower and morphed into a saucer shaped craft. It hovered a few metres off the ground in the street (Hantverksgatan, not to be confused with Hantverkaregatan) and that he could make out two beings inside.

The craft then flew along the street and he and his son followed it. It suddenly vanished and the power came back on. Johansson worked with electricty and had been on his way to the local substation to check out why there was a power cut when his son had first attracted his attention to the sky. When he got to work, another employee mentioned seeing the occurrence in the street.

According to Johansson, there were in total 4 witnesses (IIRC).

However, the fly in the ointment is this: After his initial sighting with his cousin in 1958, he reported the sighting to a UFO investigator who visited his home and conducted interviews. They had a great deal of contact. But when he witnessed the street UFO, he didn't report it to that investigator at all. He didn't report it to anybody until 8 years later.

By this time, he was conflating dates and times and possible embellishing his story. He has since passed away and the case is still debated.

 

[charliebrown]

I just remembered the Voronezh, Soviet Union 1989 where Russian children reported an alien from a space ship walking through the town.

The local policeman did report an object in the sky.

The military supposedly used “ dowsing “ to find the landing spot on the ground.

 

[Comfortably Numb]

We need a UFO to just land in a crowded street

Surely the focus should be on Bob Lazar's claims?

What if all the long established flying saucer/UFO organisations got together and coordinated a cohesive demand for a thorough government investigation.

We have, allegedly, at least nine flying saucers in captivity, which exactly corroborate Billy Meir's plentiful photographs of same, as popularly believed to have been witnessed by Kenneth Arnold on that fateful, founding day for ufology.

Even though Arnold didn't actually...

If we want disclosure, what's the problem with this coordinated approach?

The hard core evidence already exists.

At least, last I heard and whilst may be mistaken, not one of the 'long established flying saucer/UFO organisations' has suggested otherwise?

If Lazar's claims are bogus, then shouldn't that be universally tackled and exposed?

Perhaps 'disclosure' should first of all, begin at home?

Then it might become clearer why flying saucers truly never existed - as Arnold himself later reiterated - and that's why it seems unlikely we will ever see one descend outside our local supermarket?

 

[packshaud]

And then suddenly, after being dead for a while, they have respawned as UAP:
https://www.google.com/search?q=uap

I wonder what the US government is trying to deflect attention from this time...

 

[charliebrown]

It is a puzzle in that David Grusch form the July 26th Oversight hearing just all of a sudden decided to tell the world about UFOs ?

 

[Kondoru]

I think most folk see something odd in the sky and think its a Drone.

 

[CharmerKamelion]

I think most folk see something odd in the sky and think its a Drone.

As indeed a fair amount of them may well be. But there do seem to be some that behave in ways I doubt a (human-made) drone currently can.

A couple of years ago I attended a firework display with a group of friends, in a public park with several hundred other people around. While watching the fireworks, I spotted some coloured lights in the night sky behaving in odd ways (2 of them, I think). Hovering and flying up and down and going away and coming back. They were definitely not fireworks. They distracted me from the display. I kept looking at them, trying to figure them out. I pointed them out to my friends but nobody was in the slightest bit interested. Eventually I realised that they were almost certainly just drones, and I'm 99% sure that they were. But I was curious (though not all that surprised) that nobody else around seemed to be remotely curious about them. The fireworks were nice though.

Re: the 'Grusch Rush' to try and get disclosure, perhaps the various aliens who are (probably) visiting Earth are getting fed up of having to pussyfoot around with us. Must be a real pain for them treading on eggshells in case they panic us into a stampede. Maybe they've issued an ultimatum to their human agents : "pull your weird 3-knuckled finger out, humans. Tell your people about us soon or we'll do it ourselves".

 

[charliebrown]

I think people forget how long UFO talk has been with us.

The UK National Archives has declassified information in the past in that Winston Churchill was very upset about UFOs.

Churchill demanded UFO reports on a regular basis and he was afraid that religion was under attack.

As they say what is the truth ?

 

[Paul_Exeter]

As indeed a fair amount of them may well be. But there do seem to be some that behave in ways I doubt a (human-made) drone currently can.

A couple of years ago I attended a firework display with a group of friends, in a public park with several hundred other people around. While watching the fireworks, I spotted some coloured lights in the night sky behaving in odd ways (2 of them, I think). Hovering and flying up and down and going away and coming back. They were definitely not fireworks. They distracted me from the display. I kept looking at them, trying to figure them out. I pointed them out to my friends but nobody was in the slightest bit interested. Eventually I realised that they were almost certainly just drones, and I'm 99% sure that they were. But I was curious (though not all that surprised) that nobody else around seemed to be remotely curious about them. The fireworks were nice though.

Re: the 'Grusch Rush' to try and get disclosure, perhaps the various aliens who are (probably) visiting Earth are getting fed up of having to pussyfoot around with us. Must be a real pain for them treading on eggshells in case they panic us into a stampede. Maybe they've issued an ultimatum to their human agents : "pull your weird 3-knuckled finger out, humans. Tell your people about us soon or we'll do it ourselves".

A good point, and how many of the other people there were too busy filing the fireworks on their phones? I have previously posted about how I was the only passenger in a full minibus to witness a helicopter towing a geophysics array in the sky overhead, and at first it looked like a a classic saucer UFO up there. Young people especially just don't seem that interested in looking around and uo when they can instead stare at the device in their hand

 

[Paul_Exeter]

Anyway, back on track, although reports of landed UFOs with their crews disembarked and generally pointing objects at the ground have always been rare, Scottish UFO researcher Malcolm Robinson and others have highlighted that we don't seem to have had a single such case since the turn of the Century here in the UK. Lots of lights in the sky, but very little if anything beyond that.

So are witnesses more reluctant than ever to come forward in this 24/7, social media age or is it because the local and national UFO groups are either disbanded or barely active? Or perhaps witnesses are content to share their experience on Reddit or wherever and sadly it all gets lost amidst all the chatter. It is almost fifty years since the 'Welsh Triangle' and Ripperstone Farm events that saw multiple witnesses come forward with their accounts of structured ariel craft both in the sky and landed along their silver-suited occupants and how I long for another such 'wave' to take place, but perhaps it was all a product of its Cold War era and the human experience/consciousness/psyche has moved on...

 

[eburacum]

If you want a Welsh UAP incident that rivals Roswell in the 21st century, try the Pentyrch incident.
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/strange-night-welsh-field-involving-15290890

Witnesses told the Swansea UFO Network they spotted a red light to the west above, and beyond the line of trees that marked the field's western extremity. It was followed by other red lights that formed the outer edges of a huge triangle standing upright, tilted to the right, with a convex, rather than straight lower edge. They said they did not see it 'arrive' but rather it just appeared in front of them, with a suggestion it travelled inter-dimensionally. A small green-lighted object emerged from the top of the large structure, witnesses claimed, adding that the lights were so bright it was difficult to see their individual shape.Witness es explained that a the green object emerged from the top of the large one, four military planes arrived, two from the direction of RAF St Athan and two from the direction of Cardiff. The green object flashed or strobed three times and headed off to the north-west towards Llantrisant and the aircraft chased it, they claimed. It has also been recalled how the apache helicopters approached low across the fields from the south, in a pyramid formation. They were so low that the witnesses could see the grass being disturbed beneath them.

The large object then dipped to the right, turning on its axis, witness accounts claimed, adding that it descended below the tree line, but due to the trees having no leaves, the witnesses could see through them, and that as the object was turning on its axis, it was descending into the field to the north of where it had initially appeared. As the object neared the ground, the bright red lights towards the bottom of the craft became brighter and changed to street-light orange. They gave off so much light that the sides of the craft were illuminated, showing a pyramid shape to it. They told the UFO Network members that the lowest lights became really bright, almost white/orange, and released several fingers of light arcing down to the ground, like coloured lightning. The red lights then went out and the large object was no longer visible.

I should point out that this entire incident was nothing more than a routine military exercise, using different coloured lights for the convenience of the participants. An exercise that involved hundreds of regular Army personnel, several helicopters and planes, but no aliens whatsoever. Yet it continues to be celebrated by a small group of enthusiasts as a CEIII event.