The history of UFOs

Hot off the heels of last week’s story on NASAs press conference, and with a ‘military whistleblower’ claiming governments have been hiding alien tech for decades, unexplained aerial phenomena have been thrust back into the media limelight. But how far back does our interest in UFOs go?

<Sci-fi warbling. Lots of theremin>

Will - Okay. Okay. That's enough of that.

UFOs or unidentified flying objects are a phenomenon firmly embedded in many of the world's cultures. The first encounter with A UFO, if you will, was in 1947, in which pilot Kenneth Arnold claimed that he saw a string of nine shiny objects flying past Mount Rainier very, very quickly. Since then, objects of all shapes and sizes have been documented around the world. But how has our own culture shifted the discussion behind UFOs since then? Are they even called that anymore? I spoke to Illustrator and author of 'An illustrated history of UFOs' - Adam Allsuch-Boardman.

Adam - As UFOs become more synonymous with flying saucers, when you say UFO to someone, most often they'll immediately think of something from outer space. An alien for instance, The Pentagon has introduced a new term - UAP - unidentified aerial phenomenon, to make it even more clinical to try and distance itself from the sort of popular culture image. And over time our idea of a UFO has changed quite a lot from the late 40's and the 50's. We have these kinds of silver minimalist discs reflective of that sort of retro futuristic style. And over time they've seem to have become more mechanical. And nowadays we've come back round to the minimalist look with the flying white tic tac.

Will - But even with all the rebranding, it's very important to note that UFO or UAP does not mean alien life. Just because it's a flying saucer, it does not mean it is of extraterrestrial origin, it is just unidentified.

Adam - That's quite right. The majority of the time these things can be explained as something quite prosaic. Alan Hynek, who worked for the USAF in the 50's and 60's, came up with a lot of imaginative explanations for UFOs, including the reflective bellies of pelicans and swamp guests, quite famously,

Will - With the advent of smartphones and the high quality cameras that are now in pretty much everyone's pockets, surely that would mean that unidentified aerial phenomenon would see an increase in documentation. So is that the case?

Adam - Sightings kind of fluctuate over the years. For example, there was a sort of long period of excitement from the late 40's after the famous Kenneth Arnold sighting in 1947, and then Roswell after that. It was a sort of flying saucer mania and a lot of historians have decided that was sort of caused by the Cold War paranoia mixed with the reportage in newspapers and then shortly thereafter, lots of motion pictures that make people very excited about the topic.

Will - Perhaps not the expected increase in sightings then. But do these sightings have a geographical bias? Are certain places more prone to UFO tourism?

Adam - Sometimes it seems as though there is a sort of laser focus on the Northern American continent. If they are aliens, they have a great interest in North America. They do happen all over the world. It's perhaps a bias of reportage, let's say the English speaking press, being able to jump on these things as they happen and it becomes a sort of mini hysteria or some ufologists call it a flap of reportage when lots of similar sightings happen at the same time in a sort of similar area.

Will - So if UFOs do have favorite places to see, what are they doing there?

Adam - It depends if you want to look at it from a Fox Mulder perspective or a Dana Scully perspective, I suppose. If you are leaning towards that they are aliens and they have an interest in certain parts of the world, usually nuclear powers, that could be an explanation. Or the other explanation, the kind of skeptic prosaic explanation would be that there's an abundance of recording equipment and that picks them up. Or an interest in certain Hollywood films and TV shows. Perhaps. You know, I know there was an increase in membership to certain civilian UFO societies when the X-files was airing, and then it sort of dipped off when it finished.

Will - And interestingly, whilst UFOs have had an undeniable impact on our culture and certain aesthetics that might go both ways.

Adam - A lot of ufologists have pointed out a link between the kind of popular culture and what's reported in the literature or by witnesses. For instance, in the late seventies, there were a lot of UFOs that seemed to resemble what appeared in Close Encounters of the Third Kind by Stephen Spielberg, or the black triangles featured in the X-files in the nineties seem to appear around Belgium even. I think there's an interesting aesthetic link between what we represent in our films and what people see, what they expect to see even.

Will - So are people being influenced by popular culture or are UFOs stealing our fashion sense? Who's to say.

Adam - It's quite possible aliens are updating their own fashion through the years. The 50's silvery disk, their own version of a Volkswagen Beetle perhaps, and the 90's sports type, very streamlined disks. Their sort of Lamborghinis perhaps, you know, maybe aliens update their fashions. Maybe they are inspired by us, or I guess the most conspiratorial people would say that we reverse engineer technology from recovered craft. Who knows?

Will -
On the subject of individual psychology, it's important not to just play off every sighting as someone making it up.

Adam - I think people do believe what they see. Most of the time people are seeing lights in the sky at night at quite a distance, and that's not too out there, really. But do I believe it personally? I don't know, I definitely lean towards Dana Scully.

Will - Another mark for the skeptics' side. Then perhaps UFOs are less of an unknowable extraterrestrial force and more a modern day folklore. Either way, the truth is out there.