Why Look at Flying Saucers?
The psychological predilection for belief in conspiracy theories is depressing. It&#x27;s depressing because to me it feels like the other side of the coin for religious devotees. It seems to be seated in a deep need for a higher purpose and meaning.<p>When I was a kid I found all the talk of UFOs interesting. I had a fascination with space (and still do) and wanted to believe in that future.<p>What changed is in more recent years I inadvertently approached the problem from the other direction. By that I mean you look at what mankind&#x27;s future is likely to be like which can be extrapolated to the future other other spacefaring civilizations and the implications of that on the Fermi Paradox.<p>It&#x27;s a deep topic but basically the obvious energy future is to use all the Sun&#x27;s energy output (rather than &lt;1 billionth) and it&#x27;s essentially just an engineering problem (albeit a massive one) to collect and use that power. And that future is a Dyson swarm. And those aren&#x27;t the least bit subtle.<p>There are two parts I like about this:<p>1. It is based on the current understanding of physics. No magic tech or negative mass is required. If FTL is possible (and I include wormholes under FTL) or if breaking thermodynamics is possible we should be seeing a ton more not less of these things; and<p>2. The beauty of a lot of thought experiments with the Fermi Paradox is we don&#x27;t need to decide what civilizations will do on average. Instead, if any one civilization doesn&#x27;t fit that mold the whole argument falls apart. The more civilizations there are the less likely that counterargument becomes.<p>So with regards to UFOs, there are two common explanations among devotees:<p>1. Aliens and alien technology; or<p>2. Advanced technology governments are hiding.<p>In a world where the speed of light is a universal speed limit, (1) just becomes preposterous. The idea that someone would spend thousands of years getting here, hiding their presence and cooperating with governments just defies logic.<p>As for advanced technology... in 1947? Really? I just don&#x27;t believe people are capable of that AND keeping it secret for decades. Of course people will say they haven&#x27;t kept it secret and disinformation has made us all not believe it.<p>This fascination with UFOs just seems so... pointless.