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Ufology ( ) is the investigation of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) by people who believe that they may be of extraordinary origins (most frequently of extraterrestrial alien visitors). While there are instances of
government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government i ...
,
private Private or privates may refer to: Music * " In Private", by Dusty Springfield from the 1990 album ''Reputation'' * Private (band), a Denmark-based band * "Private" (Ryōko Hirosue song), from the 1999 album ''Private'', written and also recorde ...
, and fringe science investigations of UFOs, ufology is generally regarded by
skeptics Skepticism, also spelled scepticism, is a questioning attitude or doubt toward knowledge claims that are seen as mere belief or dogma. For example, if a person is skeptical about claims made by their government about an ongoing war then the ...
and science educators as a canonical example of
pseudoscience Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable claim ...
.


Etymology

Ufology is a
neologism A neologism Ancient_Greek.html"_;"title="_from_Ancient_Greek">Greek_νέο-_''néo''(="new")_and_λόγος_/''lógos''_meaning_"speech,_utterance"is_a_relatively_recent_or_isolated_term,_word,_or_phrase_that_may_be_in_the_process_of_entering_com ...
derived from ''
UFO An unidentified flying object (UFO), more recently renamed by US officials as a UAP (unidentified aerial phenomenon), is any perceived aerial phenomenon that cannot be immediately identified or explained. On investigation, most UFOs are ide ...
'' (a term apparently coined by
Edward J. Ruppelt Edward James Ruppelt (July 17, 1923 – September 15, 1960) was a United States Air Force officer probably best known for his involvement in Project Blue Book, a formal governmental study of unidentified flying objects (UFOs). He is generally ...
), and is derived from appending the acronym UFO with the suffix '' -logy'' (from the
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ...
''λογία'' (''logiā'')). Early uses of ufology include an article in ''Fantastic Universe'' (1957) and a 1958 presentation for the UFO "research organization" The Planetary Center.


Historical background

The roots of ufology include the "
mystery airships Mystery airships or phantom airships are a class of unidentified flying objects best known from a series of newspaper reports originating in the western United States and spreading east during late 1896 and early 1897.. According to researcher ...
" of the late 1890s, the "
foo fighter The term ''foo fighter'' was used by Allied aircraft pilots during World War II to describe various UFOs or mysterious aerial phenomena seen in the skies over both the European and Pacific theaters of operations. Though ''foo fighter'' initial ...
s" reported by Allied airmen during
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
, the "ghost fliers" of
Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
and
North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...
during the 1930s, the "
ghost rockets Ghost rockets ( sv, Spökraketer, also called Scandinavian ghost rockets) were rocket- or missile-shaped unidentified flying objects sighted in 1946, mostly in Sweden and nearby countries like Finland. The first reports of ghost rockets were ma ...
" of
Scandinavia Scandinavia; Sámi languages: /. ( ) is a subregion in Northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. In English usage, ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, Norway, and S ...
(mostly Sweden) in 1946, and the Kenneth Arnold "flying saucer" sighting of 1947. Media attention to the Arnold sighting helped publicize the concept of
flying saucer A flying saucer (also referred to as "a flying disc") is a descriptive term for a type of flying craft having a disc or saucer-shaped body, commonly used generically to refer to an anomalous flying object. The term was coined in 1947 but has ...
s. Publicity of UFOs increased after World War II, coinciding with the escalation of the
Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...
and strategic concerns related to the development and detection (e.g., the Ground Observer Corps) of advanced
Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
aircraft. Official, government-sponsored activities in the United States related to ufology ended in the late 1960s following the Condon Committee report and the termination of Project Blue Book. Government-sponsored, UFO-related activities in other countries, including the
United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...
, Canada, Denmark, Italy, and Sweden also ended. An exception to this trend is France, which maintains the GEIPAN program, formerly known as GEPAN (1977–1988) and SEPRA (1988–2004), operated by the French Space Agency CNES.


As a field


Status as a pseudoscience

Despite investigations sponsored by governments and private entities, ufology is not embraced by academia as a scientific field of study, and is instead generally considered a
pseudoscience Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable claim ...
by
skeptics Skepticism, also spelled scepticism, is a questioning attitude or doubt toward knowledge claims that are seen as mere belief or dogma. For example, if a person is skeptical about claims made by their government about an ongoing war then the ...
and science educators, being often included on lists of topics characterized as pseudoscience as either a partial or total pseudoscience. ''
Pseudoscience Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable claim ...
'' is a term that classifies arguments that are claimed to exemplify the methods and principles of science, but do not in fact adhere to an appropriate
scientific method The scientific method is an empirical method for acquiring knowledge that has characterized the development of science since at least the 17th century (with notable practitioners in previous centuries; see the article history of scientifi ...
, lack supporting evidence, plausibility, falsifiability, or otherwise lack scientific status. Some writers have identified social factors that contribute to the status of ufology as a pseudoscience, with one study suggesting that "any science doubt surrounding unidentified flying objects and aliens was not primarily due to the ignorance of ufologists about science, but rather a product of the respective research practices of and relations between ufology, the sciences, and government investigative bodies". One study suggests that "the rudimentary standard of science communication attending to the extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) hypothesis for UFOs inhibits public understanding of science, dissuades academic inquiry within the physical and social sciences, and undermines progressive space policy initiatives".


Current interest

In 2021, astronomer Avi Loeb launched The Galileo Project which intends to collect and report scientific evidence of extraterrestrials or extraterrestrial technology on or near Earth via telescopic observations. In Germany, the University of Würzburg is developing intelligent sensors that can help detect and analyze aerial objects in hopes of applying such technology to UAP. According to reports, the partly-public
2022 United States Congress hearings on UFOs On 17 May 2022, members of the United States House Intelligence Subcommittee on Counterterrorism, Counterintelligence and Counterproliferation held congressional hearings with top military officials to discuss military reports of unexplained ae ...
after the 2021 UFO report 'Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena' by U.S. intelligence agencies (or the
ODNI The director of national intelligence (DNI) is a senior, cabinet-level United States government official, required by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 to serve as executive head of the United States Intelligence Commu ...
) and the 2021 Pentagon UFO videos may result in the UAP issue being studied. In 2022, NASA announced a nine-month study starting in fall to help establish a road map for investigating UAP – or for reconnaissance of the publicly available data it might use for such research. A 2021
Gallup Gallup may refer to: * Gallup, Inc., a firm founded by George Gallup, well known for its opinion poll * Gallup (surname), a surname *Gallup, New Mexico, a city in New Mexico, United States ** Gallup station, an Amtrak train in downtown Gallup, New ...
poll found that belief among Americans in some UFOs being extraterrestrial spacecraft grew between 2019 and 2021 from 33% to 41%. Gallup cited increased coverage in mainstream news and scrutiny from government authorities as a factor in changing attitudes towards UFOs.


Methodological issues

Although some ufologists (e.g.,
Peter A. Sturrock Peter Andrew Sturrock (born 20 March 1924) is a British scientist. An emeritus professor of applied physics at Stanford University, much of Sturrock's career has been devoted to astrophysics, plasma physics, and solar physics, but Sturrock is int ...
) have proposed explicit methodological activities for investigation of UFOs, scientific UFO research is challenged by the facts that the phenomena are spatially and temporally unpredictable, are not reproducible, and lack tangible physicality.Denzler (2003), p. 35 That most UFO sightings have mundane explanationsMarkovsky B., "UFOs", in ''The Skeptic's Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience'', edited by Michael Shermer, 2002 Skeptics Society, p260 limits interpretive power of "interesting," extraordinary UFO-related events, with the astronomer
Carl Sagan Carl Edward Sagan (; ; November 9, 1934December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on ex ...
writing: "The reliable cases are uninteresting and the interesting cases are unreliable. Unfortunately there are no cases that are both reliable and interesting." The ufologists J. Allen Hynek and Jacques Vallée have each developed descriptive systems for characterizing UFO sightings, and by extension for organizing ufology investigations.


Phenomena linked to ufology

In addition to UFO sightings, certain supposedly related phenomena are of interest to some ufologists, including crop circles,
cattle mutilations Cattle mutilation (also known as bovine excision and unexplained livestock death, or animal mutilation) is the killing and mutilation of cattle under unusual, usually bloodless circumstances. This phenomenon has been observed among wild animals ...
, anomalous materials,
alien abductions Alien abduction (also called abduction phenomenon, alien abduction syndrome, or UFO abduction) refers to the phenomenon of people reporting their experience of being kidnapped by extraterrestrial beings and subjected to physical and psychologic ...
and implants. Some ufologists have also promoted
UFO conspiracy theories UFO conspiracy theories are a subset of conspiracy theories which argue that various governments and politicians globally, in particular the Government of the United States, are suppressing evidence that unidentified flying objects are controlled ...
, including the Roswell Incident of 1947, the
Majestic 12 Majestic 12, also known as MJ-12 for short, is a purported organization that appears in UFO conspiracy theories. The organization is claimed to be the code name of an alleged secret committee of scientists, military leaders, and government officia ...
documents, and UFO disclosure advocates. Skeptic Robert Sheaffer has accused ufology of having a "credulity explosion,"Sheaffer, Robert. "A Skeptical Perspective on UFO Abductions". In: Pritchard, Andrea & Pritchard, David E. & Mack, John E. & Kasey, Pam & Yapp, Claudia. ''Alien Discussions: Proceedings of the Abduction Study Conference''. Cambridge: North Cambridge Press. pp. 382–88. writing that, "the kind of stories generating excitement and attention in any given year would have been rejected by mainstream ufologists a few years earlier for being too outlandish." The physicist James E. McDonald also identified "cultism" and "extreme...subgroups" as negatively impacting ufology.McDonald (1968)


In Posadism

During the Cold War, ufology was synthesized with the ideas of a Trotskyist movement in South America known as Posadism. Posadism's main theorist, Juan Posadas, believed the human race must "appeal to the beings on other planets...to intervene and collaborate with Earth’s inhabitants in suppressing poverty;" i.e., Posadas wished to collaborate with extraterrestrials in order to create a socialist system on Earth. The adoption of this belief among Posadists, who had previously been a significant political force in South America, has been noted as a contributing factor in their decline.


Governmental and private ufology studies

Starting in the 1940s, investigations, studies, and conferences related to ufology were sponsored by governmental agencies and private groups. Typically motivated by visual UFO sightings, the goals of these studies included critical evaluation of the observational evidence, attempts to resolve and identify the observed events, and the development of policy recommendations. These studies include Project Sign, Project Magnet, Project Blue Book, the Robertson Panel, and the Condon Committee in the United States, the
Flying Saucer Working Party Flying Saucer Working Party (or FSWP) was the name of the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence’s (MOD) first "official study into UFOs", which has its roots in a study commissioned in 1950 by the MOD’s then Chief Scientific Adviser, the eminent ...
and Project Condign in Britain, GEIPAN in France, and Project Hessdalen in Norway. Private studies of UFO phenomena include those produced by the RAND Corporation in 1968, Harvey Rutledge of the University of Missouri from 1973 to 1980, and the National Press Club's
Disclosure Project Steven Macon Greer (June 28, 1955) is an American ufologistLewis-Kraus, Gideon (April 30, 2021How the Pentagon Started Taking U.F.O.s Seriously ''The New Yorker''. Retrieved on July 5, 2021. who founded the Center for the Study of Extraterrestria ...
in 2001. Additionally, the
United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmoni ...
from 1977 to 1979 sponsored meetings and hearings concerning UFO sightings. In August 2020, the
United States Department of Defense The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD or DOD) is an executive branch department of the federal government charged with coordinating and supervising all agencies and functions of the government directly related to national sec ...
established the
Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force The All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) is an office within the United States Office of the Secretary of Defense that investigates unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and other anomalous phenomena, sometimes termed unidentified aerial phen ...
to detect, analyze and catalog unidentified aerial phenomena that could potentially pose a threat to U.S. national security.


UFO organizations and events

A large number of private organizations dedicated to the study, discussion, and publicity of ufology and other UFO-related topics exist throughout the world, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and Switzerland. Along with such "pro-UFO" groups are skeptic organizations that emphasize the pseudoscientific nature of ufology. During the annual
World UFO Day World UFO Day is an awareness day for people to gather together and watch the skies for unidentified flying objects (UFO). The day is celebrated by some on June 24, and others on July 2. June 24 is the date that reporter Kenneth Arnold wrote is ge ...
(July 2), ufologists and associated organizations raise public awareness of ufology, in an effort to "tell the truth about earthly visits from outer space aliens." The day's events include group gatherings to search for and observe UFOs.


See also

*
Ancient astronauts Ancient astronauts (or ancient aliens) refers to a pseudoscientific hypothesis which holds that intelligent extraterrestrial beings visited Earth and made contact with humans in antiquity and prehistoric times. Proponents suggest that thi ...
* Fringe science * List of topics characterized as pseudoscience *
List of Ufologists This is a list of notable people who are ufologists (UFO researchers). Argentina * Juan Posadas, (1912–1981), Trotskyist theorist who blended together Trotskyism and Ufology. Posadas' version of Trotskyism is regarded as its own strai ...
* SETI *
UFOs in fiction Many works of fiction have featured UFOs. In most cases, as the fictional story progresses, the Earth is being invaded by hostile alien forces from outer space, usually from Mars, as depicted in early science fiction, or the people are being destr ...


References


Further reading

;Academic books about ufology as a sociological and historical phenomenon * ;Pro-ufology * * ;Skeptical opinions * * ;Ufology studies * *


External links


Ufology News

Center for UFO Studies

Mutual UFO Network

National UFO Reporting Center

Groupe d'Études et d'Informations sur les Phénomènes Aérospatiaux Non-identifiés

British UFO Research Association

Committee for Skeptical Inquiry UFO resources
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