Reply #43: good point, but false dichotomy

[dmallind]

It's not only tenable but very rational to hold the opinion that, while we are unlikely to be the only self-aware species in the universe, it is equally unlikely that any of the others have a)developed faster than light travel and b)are using it to spend any time at all hanging around earth so that they would be visible to us.

Let's consider it this way. To reach earth from anywhere else where we do not know that there is NOT intelligent life currently, the aliens must have some form of faster than light or space/time bending transportation, agreed?

If they have such a transportation, then it would not be visible in transit but only, to use sci-fi parlance, when out of "warp speed" since obviously it's impossible for humans to see something that travels faster than light. The only reason to be visible on this planet then is if they are coming here intentionally and coming out of "warp speed" within visual range of isolated Montana farms (again we have to wonder why it's NEVER in Chicago or Houston during the light of day that they do this).

So if anyone has ever seen a UFO, which managed to avoid the huge arrays of Jodrell Bank et al but be visible only to some loner on that Montana farm, they must have come here intentionally. Understanding that the alien mindset would be....well alien, we are still then left with the inescapable conclusion that the only reason for their reported behavior is neither tourism, nor education, nor conquest, since they could do any of those things far more effectively by other means or with other patterns of visitations.

Nope - if UFOs have visited earth at all, forgetting all the scientific and rational dilemmas this would cause us to have to assume, then it can only be with the rather pointless purpose of fucking with the minds of a few rural earth hicks or spacey college kids. Seems, however alien the mindset, rather a waste of interstellar travel capability I would think.