One of the most troubling aspects (to me) of the alleged 1947 Roswell,
New Mexico UFO crash is this:
 I could never understand why someone would seriously think a craft
capable of crossing interstellar distances (and therefore possessing
advances in materials science, structural engineering and navigation
controls far surpassing ours on Earth) could or would crash on our
planet.
 In addition, wouldn't such a craft have had an exotic powerplant
which would have exploded, or at the very least released catastropic
levels of radiation and sickened recovery workers and nearby
civilians?  Or left behind a footprint of elevated radiation in the
soil near the alleged crash site?

---

Clarification of Question by pcventures-ga on 09 May 2006 13:56 PDT

tutuz:

Perhaps I need to clarify.  I'm not asking this question as a
believer, but as a skeptic.  I'm far more interested in what we
believe about UFOs, why we believe, and where are the psychological
breaking points in terms of a lack of solid evidence before someone
alters a particular belief.

I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that if an extraterrestrial
were to visit, they would arrive in a pressurized craft with a very
sophisticated propulsion system, advanced (and most likely highly
fault-tolerant) navigation systems, and an internal structure and
outer skin with materials and engineering far exceeding what we
produce here on Earth.  I seriously doubt that such craft would crash,
and if they did, I would think that the now-uncontained "alien"
powerplant would release detectable amounts of some sort of radiation.

Remember, I wanted to get the perspective of both skeptics and believers...

What I thought I had invited were skeptics to say something like:

"Yes, you're really making good points and holding those UFO nuts' feet
to the fire."

or

"You're way off base, debunking UFOs is never done from that particular
point of view."

What I thought the believers might say was something like:

"Well, what crashed was a more delicate transatmospheric landing craft,
or an expendable probe that wasn't meant to return to the mother ship."

or

"You are trying to fit alien technology through a terrestrial engineering
 template.  Crew survivability, and fault tolerance are either not
priorities to our alien visitors, or are given a different priority
than we give to human air and spacecraft.  Their methods of
construction and propulsion are or may be so different that
comparisons are meaningless."

I'm simply trying to invite discussion. Although Lacus shot my thesis
full of holes, his answer was along the lines of what I am looking
for.

---

Clarification of Question by pcventures-ga on 09 May 2006 14:53 PDT

tutuz - you've provided illuminating comments and answers to some of
my questions and many others here on GA.
 All of your input is sincerely appreciated.

The Roswell Spacecraft was a prototype and the design engineers
obviously hadn't thought of everything.

They have now perfected the technology hence no more crashes despite
countless sightings.

I think that if someone *believes* in UFOs, they will find an
explanation that would complete their cosmology. For example:
- Why would it crash? They had a navigation problem and ran out of petrol. 
- Why there was no rediation? They ran out of petrol and in any case,
their technology is so advanced, that there wouldn't be radiation.

There are several of other interesting pointers: 
- How come that the larger part of the reports happen in the US? What
is there in the US that draws aliens? How come we never hear of a
spaceship that landed, say, in the deserts of Mali or Niger?
- How come that the aliens always look - according to the accounts of
those who have reportedly seen them - like aliens in movies? Could it
be that Hollywood is controlled by aliens, inserting images into our
minds?

Given the size of the universe, it is profoundly unlikely that there
are not other life forms.

If they are as 'advanced' as us, then they would probably stay well away.
- just as most people would avoid a pit full of scorpions

Seagulls and Sailboats do not leave a trail of radiation, or a 'hot
spot' when they crash.

Believing in aliens is a bit like believing in god(s)
- without tangible evidence one can assume they don't exist

Actually there is a good reason behind the ?look? attributed to
aliens. The general idea being evolution. Two million years ago we
looked pretty much like apes today, by 100k years ago Homo Sapiens had
evolved since we have kept evolving and our mandibles are getting
smaller and we have as a species begun to loose our hairy scalp
becoming more and more ?bald? or less and less like animals. Because
most of our information is supposed to be acquired through visual
means and we are less dependant on olfactory perceptions than our
ancestors if the trend continues our descendants would have larger
eyes and smaller noses than we do. As time goes by we would become
more intelligent and with that our descendants will have a larger
brain, to house that they will have a larger cranial capacity.

So you see, this is the generally described ?look? these aliens have.
Basically they are describing the likely look the human species would
have if we extrapolate evolutionary forces working on  our species
another 250k years. The idea is that these aliens are just like us but
so much more advanced that they resemble what our descendants will
look like.

A recently declassified The 400-page report entitled, "Unidentified
Aerial Phenomena in the UK Air Defence Region" concluded that there is
not, nor has there ever been, a single shred of physical evidence
whatsoever to support the notion that extraterrestrials exist. The
reason why no radioactive "footprint" or mushroom cloud resulted from
the alleged crash as Roswell is because whatever caused the ruckus in
the desert in 1947 was clearly not a UFO.

http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20060508-122856-4407r

Your assumptions bravely speculate that there was:
1. A UFO
2. A crash
3. An explosive "powerplant" onboard"
4. A radioactive property or chain of events
5. "recovery workers and nearby civilians"

Why isn't there more evidence like you suggested? Because none of the
speculations above have ever been proven or substantiated in any way.
In fact, there is more supporting evidence that suggests aliens are
responsible for "crop circles" than there is to support the Roswell
claims (and that's pretty weak, isn't it?).

tutuzdad-ga

You are engaging in too much speculation. Assumptions are that being
able to cross large distances and low speed craft maneuverability are
connected; that the unknown power source would explode or release
radiation in the event of failure (a cold fusion reactor would produce
large amounts of power with no risk of explosion or radiation
leakage); that an advanced alien race (assuming they were aliens)
would be incapable of operator error; that this was a
fully-functioning, completely intact device before the crash.

This is not an argument to believe in Roswell, but your method of
questioning could just as easily question quite real events simply
because you don't have a high familiarity with the circumstances.
That's kind of like arguing that the Hindenberg disaster clearly was
fiction because anybody who made a blimp out of hydrogen would
certainly have known that hydrogen is extremely explosive and would
have taken strong measures to prevent such a tragedy. Or perhaps that
no one would have ever done such a thing in the first place.

Personally I feel the culprit is drunk driving. One of the alien
pilots imbibed and due to impaired abilities crashed into a stationary
planet. If he hadn't been captured and dissected, his friends would
probably still be making fun of him. No one can disprove my theory, so
I feel free to believe it.

Howdy pcventures-ga,

Setting aside the debate on the existence of extraterrestrial crafts,
there is a fundamental problem that almost all "anti-UFO" arguments,
that being that these crafts have to literally cross interstellar
distances.  Wormholes, or an artifical equivalent (folding space),
would be more likely.

More than once, as well, theorists have stated that the only times
that possible extraterrestrial crafts are seen is when they have some
sort of malfunction, which is why witnesses state they also often see
the craft exhibiting erratic flight when sighted.

As pointed out by others, "exotic" does not always translate to a
power system based on radioactive, or any other toxic materials.  It
could be related to a cold fusion process, for instance.

Tutuzdad - I am not saying that extraterrestial craft exist, but reports
generated by governments are self-serving, such as when "Project Blue
Book" concluded there were no extraterrestial crafts, but also had 700
"unexplained" reports.  Now, that's a conclusive result!

The document you reference is a doozy as well!
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20060508-122856-4407r

"The report explains UFO sightings by people in Britain and around the
world are the result of 'physical, electrical and magnetic phenomena in
the atmosphere, mesosphere and ionosphere.'

The report concludes: 'The close proximity of plasma related fields can
adversely affect a vehicle or person. Local fields of this type have been
medically proven to cause responses in the temporal lobes of the human
brain.'"

How many "plasma related fields" have caused accidents on your beat?

Looking Forward, denco-ga - Google Answers Researcher

I thought it was supposed to be about gravitonics. ;-)

http://www.padrak.com/agn/AGN_2_1_3.html
1947 - Roswell crash in New Mexico yields bonanza of extraterrestrial
antigravity propulsion technology.

In response to your clarification: I appreciate your attempts to
engage others in discussion. Perhaps I'm too pragmatic to entertain
the finer technical aspects of extraterrestrial travel and the
conspiracies therefrom in the same way that I might find it difficult
to debate whether or not Samatha Stephens ('Bewitched') might
theoretically cause a global cataclysm by inadvertently twitching her
nose in her sleep in response to a dream. I certainly don't mean to
patronize you or sound condescending about your desire to debate the
UFO issue - it is interesting, after all - I'm simply not, it seems,
the right person to do it with. On a more positive note, given enough
time you will undoutedly find a number of willing participants here
who, as you well know by now, frequently and enthusiastically offer
their take on subjects much less plausible than this one; some worthy
and some not.

Wasnt there a big controversy when Candadian defense (Secretary
maybe?) said there ARE aliens and Govt. knows about it? Bush plans a
base on the Moon for this? ...my memory might be a bit off but I
remember this on the Drudge Report.

I hope you can consider a Bible based answer. Given these basic facts;
There is only ONE God. This God created the whole universe. This means
every single atom in it, all the galaxies, everything. This makes God
responsible also for ANY aliens there may be. Now consider, from the
scriptures, Proverbs 8; 22-31. It explains that Jesus Christ was
created by his Father, God, as the VERY FIRST of his creations. That
means that Jesus was present when the UNIVERSE ITSELF [ galaxies,
aliens whatever] was created. Then when MAN was created for the earth,
[ Adam and Eve and descendants] and death was introduced because of
disobedience, Jesus was SENT as part of the solution. This scenario
applies to US on earth. Now IF there were others in the universe, DID
they have similar problems that required GOD to solve. Did GOD have
other "Jesus'" to send to them. Or are the aliens so perfect they do
not need a solution. Maybe only we need a ' saviour'. And WHY would so
powerful a GOD put in so much effort for US. What makes US so
important that GOD would send his son JUST FOR US. IF there are aliens
with such advanced technology that they can span [ at least] 2.5 light
years [ closest star Alpha Centauri] then WE do not even rate. Putting
it all together, the ONLY sensible answer is that there ARE NO ALIENS,
and WE , however unbelievable, are the ONLY intelligent species [?] in
the WHOLE universe, AND WE ARE AT THE BOTTOM OF A MOST FANTASTIC
LADDER TO THE PERFECTION AND LONG [ FOREVER] LIFE THAT GOD PLANNED FOR
US IN THE BEGINNING. Will we always suffer death? No. Revelation 21;4.
Without death, we WILL be able to handle the extreme distances
involved in space travel. As well, GOD the creator, would want to be
sure that we can properly look after what we find out there, which
means we must first look after THIS earth. Revelation  11; 18 " ...and
to bring to ruin those ruining the earth...
The very first line of the Bible sets the scene. Genesis 1;1. "In the
beginning, GOD created the heavens and the earth". It does NOT say,
only the part of the heavens NEAR the earth. The remainder of the
Bible relates ONLY to us. Revelation 20; 12 says that FURTHER
information, now kept from us, will be revealed...and scrolls were
opened....

Now there's something I can argue with. In my opinion your example is
taken entirely out of context:

Genesis 1:1 says: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth."

The original Greek says: "Bree'shiyt baaraa' 'Elohiym 'eet hashaamayim
w'eet haa'aarets." meaning: "In the beginning God created all that is
above and all that is below".

This verse serves to convey that God created all that is "something"
in the midst of the "nothingness" (i.e. the void). The word translated
as "earth" here literally means "ground, land, or world", and
distinguishes the firmament, or "raqiya", meaning "vast expanse"
(wherever in the universe firmament appeared) that emerged from the
void.

This definition is not to be confused with actual references to the
"earth", as in Revelation 21:24 "And the nations of them which are
saved shall walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth do
bring their glory and honour into it.". In this scripture the ancient
Bible used the Greek work "ghay" which means "the globe" (i.e. "this
particular planet").

The Bible does not say that God created ONLY the third planet from the
sun. Clearly He created much more. The modern Bible does say God
created the earth, but the original meaning was that God created all
that "is" in the midst of all that was void. Your reference to Genesis
1:1 in an effort to make your case that God created "earth and man"
and OLNY "earth and man" is futile; in fact, the original wording of
the verse itself proves otherwise.

Sorry. My fan belt broke.

@ Tutu and my favourite JW: 
"The original Greek says: "Bree'shiyt baaraa' 'Elohiym 'eet hashaamayim
w'eet haa'aarets." meaning: "In the beginning God created all that is
above and all that is below".

This is of course "original Hebrew" and it means: 
Bereshit = at the beginning
Bara = created 
Elohim = God
et Ha Shamyim = the sky/heaven
ve and ha aretz = and the "earth" (ground)

Ok Guys & Gals

If the ancients didn't mention Space Craft in their writings (whatever
the language), it was because they hadn't then been invented.

How could they rabbit on about stuff that was beyond their ken?

I think you are vastly overcomplicating why people believe in UFO's
and subscribe to other kinds of magical thinkings.  People do this
because it makes them feel good.  It makes them feel special.  The
fact that their sense of what it is true and false is so intertwined
with what feels good blinds them of the existance of this
entanglement.  This allows them to make up absurd spighetti-like
explanations of why it must be true without seeing how ridiculous it
is.  I think you will find that people who believe in UFO's also
believe in homeopathy, remote viewing, dowsing and all of sorts of
nonsense.

That said, there is one special thing about UFO "abductions". There is
some thought that people who experience sleep paralysis, hypnagogic
and/or hypnopompic hallucinations may report this as an abduction. 
They would not be lying, just mistaken.  Eight hundred years ago
they'd say it was a succubus; today it is an alien abduction.

Interesting site on sleep paralysis:
http://watarts.uwaterloo.ca/~acheyne/S_P.html

>>>This is of course "original Hebrew"<<<

Indeed, you are quite correct. I misspoke. I should have said
"original Hebrew" (and even my exmaple was an English phonetic
transliteration of the original). Thank you for pointing out my error.

>>Indeed, you are quite correct. I misspoke. I should have said
>>original Hebrew" (and even my exmaple was an English phonetic
>>transliteration of the original). Thank you for pointing out my error.

Allow me to translate from "original English":
"If you ever correct me again I shall give you the thrashing of a lifetime"

lol frank. 
Anyway, has ANYONE heard about Canadian defense ministry saying UFO's
do/did/will exist... I cant seem to find the Drudge article..

>>Allow me to translate from "original English":
"If you ever correct me again I shall give you the thrashing of a lifetime"<<

You couldn't be more wrong. We're on the same team.  :)

frankcorrao-ga wrote:
|I think you will find that people who believe in UFO's also
believe in homeopathy, remote viewing, dowsing and all of sorts of
nonsense.|

About 20 years ago my father was retained by a fairly substantial
Belgian company to find a site and build a mineral water factory in
the UK.

He located a small site with a momma & poppa operation, and a natural
source of water. They had to sink a new borehole. A nail biting
experience.

The Belgians shipped over an elderly 'peasant farmer' for the day,
apparently he did not like to leave his cows overnight.

He wandered about with his stick, poined out a spot, and told them the
depth at which they would strike water.

To my father's and the drilling team's astonishment, he was spot on.

It seems that some dowsing works.

Personally I reckon that believing in things for which there is no
tangible evidence is weak minded, but to dismiss the possibility out
of hand is rather unscientific.

I'd say the actuality of the Roswell event is still in question. A lot
of study on the subject concludes that it was not a UFO that caused
the occurence. But I believe some secrets are still being kept about
it and the secret keepers aren't too excited to let the whole story
out yet, though I'm sure we all would wish to know what the hell
really happened.

However, the historicity of Roswell does not affect the issue of
whether alien beings exist or not, and cannot be used for that
discussion. There are so many other events and objects that are more
involved and influential in this discussion than a rumored spacecraft
crash.

And on the crash not emitting radiation... do all UFOs have to have
radiation-based technology?

Dear Tutuz. I don't think I said that God created ' ONLY earth and
man. He in fact created everything. I think you may have mis-read my
comment.

Perhaps I did. I took your comment to imply that since the Bible
indicates that God created the "heavens and the earth" and your
argument that we are the only intelligent species that you were using
Genesis to support the argument that God could only have created ONE
intelligent species on ONE earth. Forgive the error if I was mistaken.

hey tutuzdad...u gotta admit god knows what hes doin. in the
beginning, god created the heavens and the earth yea? and then he saw
that it was dark and all and said let there be light...and BING. light
happened. which brings me to the conclusion that god made the heavens
and the earth in the dark. i need light to do most constructive
things...so in my eyes hes pretty special dont u think?

oh yea and also i thought it got proved that it was a goverment
attempt at bulding a new fangled fighter jet that could hover and it
either went tits up or was just far too expensive to run???

also...we havent yet got to the very bottoms of the oceans yet so
creatures that inhabit earth are still unknown. so what makes you
think they came from SPACE?

which brings me to yet another conclusion..how do we kno its not a
probe? i mean think about it we send Voyeger and a few other probes
into space, how do we kno that some poor blokes now stood wondering
why a UFO has just crashed through the roof of his house on his
homeworld?

I believe the most relevant comment on this discussion was
TUTUZDAD-GA's initial comment.

As someone who used to be open to the possibility that UFO reports
represented some real unexplained phenomena (including visitations of
aliens to our planet), I am now a complete sceptic.

Of the Hundreds of Thousands of reported sighting since the late
Nineteen forties, I believe all of them are either mis-identifications
of natural/man-made phenomena or hoaxes.

Some further points:

1. The discussion of whether there is life elsewhere in our galaxy or
whether we or other aliens can develop technology to do interstellar
travel should be divorced from the issue of the cause of the UFO
sightings since Kenneth Arnold's initial sighting in the 1940's.

2. A truly difficult case to explain would be one where there were
independent witness's AND the observed event was impossible to
explain. By independent witness I mean two or more people who do not
know each other but have observed the same phenomena at the same
time/geographical location.
Of the Hundreds of thousands of cases , I have yet to read about one
where this is the case.

3. It now emeges that in some of the High Profile cases (e.g.Travis
Walton Abduction case, Hill;s Lost time case ) the principles had a
deep interest in UFOs BEFORE the case happened.

4. The number of reported UFO cases in recent years have dropped 
   significantly. Have aliens got bored with visiting us?

  Mongolia

The UFOs are still visiting, mongolia-ga, but the Watchers have got
upset at being mocked and ignored.

Remember the story of the Boy Who Cried Wolf?

Being in dire need of strict self-discipline at my desk if I?m to get
any work done at all, I don?t often allow myself to give in to the
temptation to participate in discussions like these, nor do I really
have the time now :-) but I see a pattern here that really makes me
crazy, so I?m going to go ahead and throw in my two cents for whatever
it?s worth.

The problem I see with this discussion (and others like it) is that
only two alternatives are presented, as if they are the only
possibilities. In discussion like this, on this topic, it is assumed
one must be either a ?believer? or a skeptic. Furthermore, if one
?believes in UFOs,? then it is assumed that belief consists of a
conviction that these objects must be actual physical crafts, from
another part of our physical universe, piloted by actual physical
?alien? beings from some other world. If one is a skeptic, one is
assumed to debunk not only the conclusions of the believers, but even
the possibility that anything unexplained (or at least unexplainable)
has occurred. However, I would like to propose a third position. For
want of a better term, I?ll call it a ?seeker.?

This position acknowledges that there do indeed exist curious and as
yet unexplained phenomena, seen and reported by credible witnesses,
whose accounts cannot be readily dismissed out of hand. However, since
there is (as yet) no incontrovertible evidence to support any one
hypothesis over another, the seeker remains unconvinced of the ?what?
or ?why? but remains open-minded to consider any and all plausible
(and even  not so plausible) explanations, without necessity of
?believing? any of them.

The starting point for such consideration, I think, in this case, must
be remembering that the familiar acronym merely means ?unidentified
flying objects,? which most of us must agree exist, if only as that
literally..

But then, instead of confining conjecture to the merely physical
(although certainly including it), a seeker is free to stretch his
mind beyond that boundary to also consider such possibilities as that
perhaps these visible manifestations are not physical in the obvious
sense of belonging to and originating from this universe as we know
it, but might originate in some other dimension, come from or through
interdimensional space, have traveled across barriers of time, or are
perhaps even spiritual in origin and/or nature. Now the latter may not
appeal to the agnostic or atheist among us, but surely current work in
quantum mechanics would at least allow some serious consideration of
the former by even the most skeptical of scientific minds.

To me, a seeker, remembering always that knowledge we now possess
would have seemed fantastic in former times, is manifestly unwilling
to ever assume our current understanding on any topic, without
conclusive evidence, is final, but rather acknowledges the possibility
of further truths that we just haven?t discovered yet. And even where
"evidence" exists, a seeker strives to always maintain an open and
ever-questioning mind, being ever curious and willing to learn.

Ok, hopefully I?ve opened a can of worms which can be let out for a
bit of air and maybe to wiggle some

?A truly difficult case to explain would be one where there were
independent witness's AND the observed event was impossible to
explain. By independent witness I mean two or more people who do not
know each other but have observed the same phenomena at the same
time/geographical location.
Of the Hundreds of thousands of cases , I have yet to read about one
where this is the case.?


Simply Yahoo or Google ?Mexico UFO sightings? (without the quotes) and
you?ll get tons of links to stories that covered the very well
documented Mexican sightings not too long ago. Incidentally, other
sightings that also fit the bill and covered much of the United
Statesian southwest had happened just weeks before.

Personally I am convinced life exists elsewhere, the universe is too
big and life so simple that it is almost an impossibility for that not
to be the case. Earth is about 4.8 billion years old, we know that
life existed here about 4.6 billion years ago, from a cosmological
point of view it happened almost instantly. It then took 3.3 billion
years for it to be anything more than unicellular but when it happened
it was explosive. It all leads one to believe that when the right
circumstances exist life will happen in no time at all, but it doesn?t
mean that evolution will necessarily follow. If something somehow
forces/introduces evolutionary advantages then the results are
fantastic. Lastly, intelligent life is not a forgone conclusion of
evolution. After all, evolutionary forces were at work on this planet
for over 600 million years before our ancestors started using
intelligence as an evolutionary advantage less than 1 million years
ago. So life must permeate the universe, and it is likely that
99.9999% is unicellular, in the very few places that intelligence must
have arisen the distances and times involved are so great that we may
never encounter them or vice-versa. Even if we make Drake?s equation
http://www.activemind.com/Mysterious/Topics/SETI/drake_equation.html  
 ten times more likely it is still unlikely that we will ever
encounter intelligent life elsewhere.

However, unexplained phenomena exist because we don?t know everything
yet. Millennia ago people didn?t understand lightning, wind or fire
and so, they made them Gods. Today there are other natural phenomena
that we are from time to time exposed to, because we don?t understand
it and we are too intelligent to instantly make that into Gods we use
the next most plausible explanation; extraterrestrials.

Interesting.... very interesting... but _ _ _ _ _ _ !

:-)

elids, 

I think you have just answered the question 100%

And opened a pair of eyes.

Thank you.

@byrd:
Normally I would agree that we tend to create a false dichotomy in
these things-ignoring the perfectly valid "i'm not sure" position. 
But in this case, is such a position really defensable?  I don't know
of any such unexplained UFO phenomena with credible witnesses where no
prosaic explanation suffices.

I havent bothered to read through all the stuff above. Too much of it,
and too much of it isnt even really related.

Speaking strictly as a physicist.

There is no reason to assume such a craft, if it does truly exist (I
do not believe it did, but I will assume it did for sake of argument)
would crash. There is also no reason to assume it wouldn't crash.
It's plausible that it perhaps collided into something in our
atmosphere/in orbit around the earth. Maybe the crew on board had a
fight, or spilt coffee on the controls? Who are we to say why such a
thing would crash.

You can not comment on 'their technology is so advanced that there
wouldnt be any radiation'...
Speaking as a physicist, again
Such a craft would likely be using a SCRAM or RAM jet style engine,
which would produce only H2O (Water). However, using such a device, it
would take a ridiculously long amount of time to travel any distance
in the universe. The most likely method would have been an anti-matter
drive (Yes, believe it or not!). Inherent confinement problems, and
cost in production, are the main things stopping us from creating
these ourself at the moment, but the principles of it is fine. An
anti-matter drive would leave 0 radiation/pollution, in normal use or
if it crashed and the 'fuel' spilt out everywhere. It'd produce a very
bright flash of light (if you want to assume that they'd carry 1
kilogram of antimatter, and you'd have 1 kilogram of matter to react
it with, then you'd produce 2 c ^ 2 joules of light, then you can
assume a bunch about its spectra and work out that it produces a
stupid amount of billions of photons). Which would probably have been
seen around the world.

My philosophy teacher always said that the reports of UFOs in the US,
were for one very simple reason. I'll let you work it out yourself.

Having recently read a book called Space, or something similiar, I
must agree with it's author that the best way to spread a race
throughout a galaxy would be through nanobots, and replicating when
you get to a planet, and then sending off from that planet to other
places.

Yes, there are probably millions of other alien spieces out there,
(note, all with their own belief systems. The only reason Christianity
is so predominant on this planet is because it was forced upon many
people, and also because they shout loudest). So let's ignore the God
side of things for now.

Whose to say what an alien looks like, and why would you come to the
irrational conclusion that Hollywood is controlled by aliens? That's
perhaps the most stupid I've ever heard.
If you were an alien race, would you really travel thousands (likely)
of years to get to another planet just to take over the Media
industry? Or just to say 'Take me to your leader'? no, you'd probably
take over the planet, or you'd begin trade, or something.
I hate to say, but there's a reason why scientists dont believe in UFO
reports on the Earth. Most of us do believe in life in other places in
the universe, but I'd be very amazed if even 1% of us believed
seriously that aliens have come to this planet.
Why? We're some of the most analytical people in the world, we try not
to derive conclusions before we've looked at serious amounts of
evidence, and as it stands, evidence for UFOs just dont stack up.

But, browha-ga ...

If you should ever browse through history, you will find lots of
examples of how so-called 'scientists' have got things wrong!

The very word 'scientist' suggests a level of infallibility that reeks
with pretension.

It's OK to state hypotheses but what we all need is proof positive.

PB

(A former inhabitant of Saturn)

Skeptic Perspective:
[quote may 2004 Sky and Telescope, A Debunker's Guide to Cosmic
Nonsense, p 42 "Alien Abductions and UFOs"] If Roswell is the
crash-landing site of a spaceship, it means that aliens had the
technology to travel trillions of kilometers but lost control just a
few hundred meters from the ground. Who built their transports,
Microsoft? [unquote] Personally, I 100% agree with the above statement
although I believe Microsoft makes one of the best OSs, specially with
Vista.

Probonopublico-GA

This is a common misconception.

Science as it stands has only truly existed since Newtonian times
perhaps you can debate that there were strong aspects of it that
existed back during the 1500s, from Gallilean experiments. (May have
the date wrong, I'm not a historian).

Most of what you consider 'scientists being wrong' is not actually true.
We create approximations that work for 'certain conditions' or under,
for example, 'low ranges'. As we get the capability to explore
further, with stronger mathematics and higher energy probes, we can
see that all our current approximations tend towards one underlying
set of equations, aka the theory of everything. 'Scientists' making
errors in history (I'm sure you're thinking of the world being flat?
No one ever truly believed that, other than the Church. This is
another common misconception. It is blatantly obvious to anyone with a
couple braincells that it is not flat. Just watch a ship come over the
horizon. You see the top of it first).
Scientists, as I define them, are people who create hypotheses, and
test them, to fail or break. Alternatively, they look at existing
evidence, create a hypothesis, and from that create a prediction to
which further test.

Scientists are very rarely wrong, its just that our approximations
break down at certain levels ;)
Some scientists have said excessively dumb things, but over the last
hundred years, this is starting to become a bit less common place ;)
Alot of scientists reported in the media nowadays, with things like
'free energy' or 'vacuum energy generators' are not truly scientists.
(If you want me to talk about free energy and things, feel free to ask).
To be fair, even Einstein wasnt a fan of Quantum Theory, despite being
the person who essentially got the ball rolling with his photoeletric
effect.

If you'd like to doubt any of the statements I've made here, or in the
one above, feel free to ask and I'll try my best to further
explain/whatever myself.

:)

Oh and a further thing.

Who are we to tell them what they can or cannot do, with regards to crashing.
Perhaps the craft was created of something that oxidized really fast
in oxygen, or the nitrogen leaked in and was fatal, etc. There are
many reasons, you are not in any position to tell an alien how to fly.
Personally, my favorite quote to illustrate this is...

Einstein - 'God doesnt play dice with the universe!' (In response to
quantum mechanics)
Schroedinger - 'Don't tell God what to do'

I know this is old, but I found a reference to the quote by Canadian
Paul Hellyer (Canada?s Defence Minister from 1963-67) at the
University of Toronto that sonoritygenius mentioned.

In fact, there's a link to the speech at Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Hellyer (I can't get it to open,
perhaps you'll have better luck:

Full video presentation of Hon. Paul Hellyer September 25th, 2005 UFO
disclosure speech at the Toronto Exopolitics Conference
http://www.jerrypippin.com/video/PaulHellyerAtTorontoConference-25-09-05.wmv

A synopsis:
http://davidboyd.org/posts/1132954628.shtml
..."On September 25, 2005, in a startling speech at the University of
Toronto that caught the attention of mainstream newspapers and
magazines, Paul Hellyer, Canada?s Defence Minister from 1963-67 under
Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Prime Minister Lester Pearson, publicly
stated: "UFOs, are as real as the airplanes that fly over your head."

Mr. Hellyer went on to say, "I'm so concerned about what the
consequences might be of starting an intergalactic war, that I just
think I had to say something."

Hellyer warned, "The United States military are preparing weapons
which could be used against the aliens, and they could get us into an
intergalactic war without us ever having any warning. He stated, "The
Bush administration has finally agreed to let the military build a
forward base on the moon, which will put them in a better position to
keep track of the goings and comings of the visitors from space, and
to shoot at them, if they so decide." ..."

I remain a 'seeker', as byrd put it, simply because of the fact
that the military's explanation is so much less believable than
the conclusions of the witnesses, so a UFO seems more likely.

The witnessed fact, which was acknowledged by the military, is
that soldiers were assembled to walk the 23 acre (1 million square
feet) "debris field" shoulder-to-shoulder, and pick up every scrap
of whatever was there.

How does that make ANY sense to ANY person if the debris was
merely the scattered, shattered remains of Mogul 4:

"According to Charles Moore [former Mogul project engineer],
 Flight 4 consisted of 28 neoprene, meteorological-sounding
 (i.e., weather) balloons attached to a 600-foot-long master
 line of braided nylon cord, three ML-307B rawin radar targets,
 possibly one or more silk-canopy parachutes, and a variety of
 test equipment such as a sonobuoy microphone, radio transmitter,
 dry cells, and plastic containers holding solid and liquid
 ballast. All components and systems were ordinary off-the-shelf
 items; only the Mogul program objective was classified."
Much more analysis of the debris field on the page:
http://www.think-aboutit.com/ufo/an_engineer_looks_at_the_project.htm

None of this supposed debris was, itself, classified, and there
are no stories, to my knowledge, of soldiers being ordered to
clean other crashed balloon sites in such a meticulous fashion.

So one can only wonder what kind of materials were so carefully
recovered and secreted away. At least two truckloads were seen
to be hauled away.

I've just added a comment. Should I stay around for another 30 days
and see if anyone else turns up ... I'm sure I can see ET lurking over
near comment #22.