UFO Phenomenon
Image taken from newscientist.com
Many people vary on the belief in the existence of UFOs. Before we go any further, one thing must be set straight. The letters UFO refer “Unidentified Flying Object.” Now this can be anything from a balloon to a secret government plane. So yes UFOs do exist. If we do not know what something is then it is unidentified. Yet, saying that the UFO is an extraterrestrial vehicle from another part of our galaxy is where the skepticism comes in.
Kenneth Arnold was a pilot who was totally oblivious to the idea of aliens. In 1947, he was flying over the Cascade Mountains in Washington. He saw something that was sharing his airspace. Arnold described it as being like “saucers skipping over the water.” This phrase was coined and has now become known as “flying saucers.” A few weeks after the pilot’s encounter with the UFO, the famous Roswell incident occurred. The United States Air Force claimed the incident was a recovery of one of it’s top secret weather balloons.
Since this event, the belief in life on other planets has become a phenomenon in it’s own right. Roswell has become the target of controversy for UFO enthusiasts and deniers alike. A poll showed that almost 11% of Americans have seen objects in the sky that behaved erratically. Could they all be making it up for a publicity stunt or are they telling the truth? No matter how much proof we may have, we will truly never know unless we can see for ourselves.
(Source: Henshaw, Peter. Strange Phenomena. 2008)
