Exobiology: SETI vs. the UFO: Part One

Exobiology was the original term given to the sciences central to the question of life-in-the-Universe. It’s now been largely replaced by Astrobiology, but I’ll stick with the original. Assuming one or more extraterrestrial civilizations with advanced, interstellar spaceflight capability exists; then they know about Planet Earth. Say ‘hi’ to those pesky UFOs, a concept surprisingly either dismissed or ignored by those most interested in extraterrestrial intelligences: SETI scientists.

Radio (and other) astronomers who search for signs of extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) in the cosmos appear to have little if any real interest in other avenues that have potential bearing on the issue, which makes we wonder about just how bona fide their overall interest in ETI really is. That’s because they tend not only to ignore those avenues, but often actively thumb their collective noses at, and ridicule subjects such as UFOs and ancient astronauts. I think they should have the academic courage to investigate these fields as well, as there is IMHO an ETI signal of wheat within the UFO (and ancient astronaut) chaffy noise.

The phrase ‘Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence’ (SETI) says nothing at all about how to search. Traditionally, the usual ways and means have centred on using the radio part of the electromagnetic spectrum, and the engineering techniques and technology tried and true to radio astronomy to seek out new or established radio communicating civilizations. That is, we position radio telescopes to either target various specific points in the sky at stellar objects that theory suggest E.T. might be located around and might be deliberately broadcasting from with a view towards interstellar communication, or just sweeping the sky willy-nilly in hopes of detecting general radio leaking from civilizations broadcasting, perhaps just for their own use (radio, TV, radar) somewhere out there.  SETI is based mainly on a theoretical premise that technologically advanced civilizations – advanced enough to have radio communications – exist and can have said technology detectable by us at a distance.

SETI has also searched the optical and infrared parts of the electromagnetic spectrum for signs of advanced extraterrestrial technology, as well as trying several other approaches as well, like looking for possible alien artefacts at various strategic locations in outer space – like the asteroid belt or the Earth-Moon Lagrangian points where objects so positioned tend to have long duration stability. 

But SETI, after five decades of scanning the heavens for intelligent messages, have managed to come up with only one ‘WOW’ signal; one unknown signal, one unidentified signal, that unfortunately never repeated itself and thus couldn’t ever be scientifically and properly verified.

For some strange reason however, SETI scientists exclude alien artefacts that have any potential connection with UFOs, and closely related the concept of ‘ancient astronauts’. That seems to be putting your SETI eggs in relatively fewer baskets than is necessary! I mean, SETI is trying to find extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI). If UFOs and/or ancient astronauts provide evidence or support for the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence, you’d think SETI scientists would include UFOs and/or ancient astronauts in their collective baskets.

Now I’m not claiming here that UFOs provide the ‘smoking gun’ establishing proof positive for the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence. I am suggesting however that there must be something highly suggestive in the collective evidence over more than six decades of the modern UFO era that point to extraterrestrial intelligence as a plausible answer.

To be continued...