If you happen to follow the complex and perplexing world of unidentified flying objects, now tied to the term unidentified anomalous phenomena, or UAP, then you definately’re aware that we could also be inching toward “full disclosure.”
What which means is uncorking the bottle filled to the brim with an elixir of truth, say disclosure activists, that Earth has been on the receiving end of exotic craft of off-world origin. Much more, there are allegations of a covert U.S. government reverse engineering program set as much as essentially write an operators manual on how these alleged anomalous vehicles function.
The drumbeat that the U.S. government is able to spill the beans on possible alien guests to Earth is louder than ever. But whether it’s next week, next 12 months or next decade, what are the social consequences of first contact? Or, at the very least some outing of historical records documenting evidence of holiday makers from afar? Are we ready for such a revelation? There appears to be debate on what the ripple effects may be.
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Full-body-contact
In line with one recent public poll, a majority of those sampled imagine the federal government could also be covering up the reality about UFOs.
Other polls have found that almost all Americans imagine in intelligent life beyond Earth. Indeed, poll data shows an uptick in pondering through the years that there’s an off-Earth population of aliens frolicking about on the market within the extraterrestrial ether.
But given the specter of full disclosure, are we ready for full-body-contact?
Higher data needed
“Quite a little bit of work has been done on the societal impact of discovering radio signals from extraterrestrials beaming a message from a planet circling a distant star,” said Steven Dick an American astronomer and creator noted for his work in the sector of astrobiology.
“But that could be very different from the implications in the event that they are literally here in the shape of UFOs or UAPs. Science fiction tends toward the dramatic,” Dick told Space.com.
“I find it unlikely that the U.S. Government could keep a secret of this magnitude for this long. I’m all for studying the anomalous phenomena of UFOs/UAPs. But I’m not convinced by the blurry Navy videos that these are spacecraft piloted by ET, and even ET-related artificial intelligence. We want higher data,” Dick advised.
Worldviews would change
In Dick’s opinion, disastrous first contact events with uncontacted cultures aren’t necessarily one of the best analogies. There are many useful intercultural contacts throughout history, he said, corresponding to trade relations going back to precedent days even beyond the Bronze Age.
“Whether contact is direct or distant and assuming we survive direct contact, I’d say what is definite is that our philosophical and theological worldviews would change,” said Dick. “We should always not expect extraterrestrials to unravel all our problems, however the interchange of data could be very interesting!”
As for the query: Are we ready?
“Probably not,” Dick said, “but latest fields of study like ‘astrotheology’ and ‘astroethics’ are laying out the choices. There may be some consensus that religions will survive, but in greatly altered form to bear in mind that we aren’t the moral center of the universe or essentially the most intelligent beings. Some religions shall be more adaptable than others,” he said.
Copernican moment
John Elliott is coordinator of the SETI Post Detection Hub throughout the School of Computer Science on the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.
Elliott sees the societal impact of discovering extraterrestrial life as a profound “Copernican type” moment for humankind. “The impact is more likely to be proportionate to its proximity to us and whether it’s intelligent or not. It’ll be the confirmation that we aren’t the one life within the universe, and our perceived central ‘importance’ will receive a big shift in perspective,” he said.
Also, such a discovery will indicate that life might be common throughout the universe, Elliott said. “To what extent extraterrestrial life is intelligent or has preceded us or is now extinct are other questions. Preparation for such an event is due to this fact not planning for only one possible scenario but many,” he said.
SETI post detection is “probably some of the multi-disciplinary endeavors humanity has ever undertaken,” Elliott added, “not just for assessing the evidence discovered, but additionally for considering the human social response, impact strategies and protocols.”
Elliott said that the hub’s primary role on the university is to function a dedicated international “home” for facilitating and coordinating research right into a coherent post-detection framework, to work on topics starting from message decipherment and data analytics to development of regulatory protocols, space law and societal impact strategies, “a project that shall be ever evolving,” he noted.
Imminent disclosure
“The refrain that full disclosure is imminent is one which has been voiced since almost the very start of the flying saucer era in 1947,” observed Greg Eghigian, a professor of history and bioethics at Pennsylvania State University. He’s creator of a forthcoming book on the history of UFOs in america.
Eghigian told Space.com that, despite the indisputable fact that various states — including the U.S. and the UK — have released an enormous variety of classified documents through the years, “it has never satisfied some who will only be content if governments reveal that they’re withholding information concerning the extraterrestrial origins of UFOs.”
Based on the past, Eghigian said there’s little reason to suspect things shall be playing out any in another way now.
Different consequences
On the subject of “are we ready for revelation,” the scenario of actual alien intelligence contact/confirmation isn’t in truth one scenario but somewhat multiple scenarios.
“Such an event could play out in any variety of the way — from astronomical observations of what look like signs of a once existent technologically advanced civilization to the invention of alien artifacts in space to visitors appearing here on Earth,” Eghigian said.
“Every scenario would likely have considerably different consequences, lots of which I think wouldn’t have much of an effect on most individuals’s lives,” Eghigian concluded.