Why Saucers?

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Why are most people's descriptions of UFOs almost always saucers, disks or shaped like M and Ms(tm)? Aren't they more creative than that?

[Prester John]

Because thats what balloons look like at a distance?

[Thanz]

Quote:

Originally posted by SkepticJ
Why are most people's descriptions of UFOs almost always saucers, disks or shaped like M and Ms(tm)? Aren't they more creative than that?

Because they are easy to make for low-budget sci fi films. Pie plates, hubcaps, frisbees...

[Johnny Pneumatic]

What I wonder is do more people hallucinate, lie or just don't see what is really there(weather balloon, plane, flare, space junk reflecting light or reentering, light reflected off of thermal layers in the air)

[Morwen]

It's even funnier than that. Everybody sees saucers because a journalist made a mistake.

From the (very interesting) essay:

Quote:

When the newsman Bill Bequette wrote the story up for the news services he recalled Arnold's describing the motion of the objects as like a saucer if you skip it across the water. Jumbling the metaphorical intent of the description, Bequette labeled the objects "flying* saucers", Arnold said the term arose from "a great deal of misunderstanding". The public, however, did not know that.

I love this story.


Edited: it's "essay", not "assay". Argh.

[geni]

Quote:

Originally posted by SkepticJ
Why are most people's descriptions of UFOs almost always saucers, disks or shaped like M and Ms(tm)? Aren't they more creative than that?

I suspect that this dates back to The first will publisiced sighting where the person involed describe the objects flying like a scaucer skipping across the water. One journaist changed this to "flying saucer" and the idea apears to have stuck. On the other hand plenty of cigar shaped objects and triangles have been reported.

eddited to add beaten to it.

[Thanz]

Quote:

Originally posted by geni
I suspect that this dates back to The first will publisiced sighting where the person involed describe the objects flying like a scaucer skipping across the water. One journaist changed this to "flying saucer" and the idea apears to have stuck. On the other hand plenty of cigar shaped objects and triangles have been reported.

eddited to add beaten to it.

That's quite interesting - I had not heard that before. Of course, from a distance a flying saucer looked at edge-on would look very much like a cigar shaped object. I suppose that the common thread in UFO sightings is the lack of discernable wings, for the obvious reason that if you see wings, it's an airplane.

One more thing - I have heard somewhere that some of the "triangle" sightings were testings of the stealth bomber. Anyone know if this is true?

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Quote:

Originally posted by Thanz
One more thing - I have heard somewhere that some of the "triangle" sightings were testings of the stealth bomber. Anyone know if this is true?

If I were a UFO believer back in the 80s before it was declassified I would believe it was from another world. Just look at the thing, its neat. Same goes for the F-117, SR-71 and the new Black aircraft that the military must be working on.

[Hellbound]

Some of the UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles) the military tests in south Florida have been reported. One, in particular, is a saucer-shaped vectored-thrust craft (it has a ring of downward facing turbofans) is saucer-shaped, with cameras and such for recon mounted on the underside center. It's not that big, but considering it's saucer shaped and flying it's easy to see how some would get confused.

[Chad Noles]

Most UFO's are saucer shaped because everyone knows that TARDIS shaped ones are not very stable or predictable in their flight paths and plans.

[hgc]

Quote:

Originally posted by geni
I suspect that this dates back to The first will publisiced sighting where the person involed describe the objects flying like a scaucer skipping across the water. One journaist changed this to "flying saucer" and the idea apears to have stuck. On the other hand plenty of cigar shaped objects and triangles have been reported.

eddited to add beaten to it.

I had thought the flying saucer dated from that air force pilot who famously reported a saucer-shaped UFO in the 1940's, this being one of the first such incidences.

Flying cigar is the common nick for UFO's in France. It's even the name for a wine. Probably an early spotter there said it was cigar shaped.

[Abdul Alhazred]

Quote:

Originally posted by SkepticJ
Why are most people's descriptions of UFOs almost always saucers, disks or shaped like M and Ms(tm)? Aren't they more creative than that?

Just a nitpick. The saucers are not strictly speaking unidentified flying objects (UFOs), to those who know.

No, I'm not going to spin you some clearly nonsensical story of extraterrestrials.

They are clearly explorers from inside the Earth, who emerge from Symmes's Hole, which is actually much smaller than in the picture.

<img src="http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/day/dayimages/hollow_earth.jpg" height=412

[Batman Jr.]

Here's a photograph purported to be one of the triangular aircraft seen by many Belgians over a period of several years:



I'd sooner say that this picture was hoaxed than say that it depicts an F-117. If this is a hoax, then it's possible what people really saw was an F-117, but if this is legitimate, then we may have something more interesting on our hands like a new black budget project or something else even more exciting. I've also heard a hypothesis that what people had observed was a set of three reconnaissance satellites, but I don't know enough about the case to either agree or disagree with this notion.

[Astrophotographer]

Quote:

Originally posted by Batman Jr.
Here's a photograph purported to be one of the triangular aircraft seen by many Belgians over a period of several years:

The background regarding this photograph is somewhat suspect. Wim Van Utrecht was able to duplicate the image using a hoax technique. You can see the hoax image in Jenny Randles "Danger in the air", it looks a lot like this one. Like most UFO photographs, it was taken by one person and could not be verified by others independent of the photographer.

[geni]

Quote:

Originally posted by Batman Jr.

I'd sooner say that this picture was hoaxed than say that it depicts an F-117. If this is a hoax, then it's possible what people really saw was an F-117, but if this is legitimate, then we may have something more interesting on our hands like a new black budget project or something else even more exciting. I've also heard a hypothesis that what people had observed was a set of three reconnaissance satellites, but I don't know enough about the case to either agree or disagree with this notion.

I don't feel that it is very likly that the Us air force is going to let 1000's of civilians see a clasified aircraft. It also makes no sense to fly it in europe at all.

[JMA]

Hi,

Quote:

Originally posted by Batman Jr.

I'd sooner say that this picture was hoaxed than say that it depicts an F-117.

The most amazing aspect of the Belgian UFO Wave is:

More than 1000 witness over 3 years = 1 picture (and that's the picture).

For the french skeptic, it's not an F-117, the picture is a fake, and the Wave is a kind of sociological "flap" (See Klass and the UFO Wave "Law")...

But you should know that the SOBEPS, the ufo-believer group who "investigate" the wave, wrote a new article this year in a science vulgarisation magazine for teenager (!!!) saying that "new analysis shows that the Petit-Rechain picture can't be a fake"...

So you'll probably ear about this picture again in the future...

See you,

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Photos are not very good evidence anymore. Ever heard of Photoshop? Someone who is skilled enough with it could take a photo of you, give you another set of arms and then put Jennifer Lopez by your side. Then they will fake the shading and shadows. It will look real.

[Mojo]

Quote:

Originally posted by SkepticJ
DNA is still DNA even if the nucleotides are different.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "if the nucleotides are different." If you mean with different base pairs (assuming that there are other possible base pairs that would fit) then, OK, it could still be described as DNA. However, the sugar/phosphate backbone to the molecule is still a complex structure, highly unlikely to have evolved independently elsewhere. If the structure is different it is not DNA.

Alien life would need something analogous to DNA, probably consisting of a long polymeric chain molecule, but it's highly improbable that it would have an identical structure. It's probably safe to say that any creature with DNA (or even RNA) shares a common ancestor with us.

[Yeah_Right]

One of the most interesting, and perhaps, far fetched explanation for why people see a saucer type of UFO is from the psychologist Carl Jung. He theorized, if I can use that word, that since saucers were a circle, and circles were a symbol of God, then the UFO was representation of mans desire for transendence. I think I have that correct, I haven't read his "UFOs a Modern Myth" in quite a while. I suppose the idea is plausible, but completely unproveable of course. I personally stick the to the reporter that wrote about Kenneth Arnold's sighting and coined the term "Flying Saucer"

Of course these days flying triangles seem to be all the rage for the ufologists, and what Jung would have said about them I am not sure. I suppose they'd have some sort of alchemical significance. There are cigar shaped craft too, more of a Freudian thing there. I really think what it comes down to is what we seem to think is the most aerodynamic shape, saucer shapes do make a cool frisbee.