There is distinctly a probability that somewhere alien life has evolved and probably looks pretty different than us, but it might be out there. Slightly different question. How many of us believe that aliens have visited earth . Sergio b only man with a strength of his convictions. Another question. Is the idea that aliens have visited earth, in and of itself, a Conspiracy Theory . Sergio . Probably not. If you take into account that we are trying to get to mars, there would technically be alien life there. To say that another life form has become intelligent enough to do space travel and visit another planet is not a Conspiracy Theory. Felix harcourt that seems fair. It depends on how you define the scope of a Conspiracy Theory. It would take a species collaborating together to land on another planet. Felix harcourt that seems reasonable. It seems a little odd to indict the entire planet of wherever for wanting to come to visit. Even if we are arguably maybe we could consider it a Conspiracy Theory, it would be a conspiracy of aliens among themselves which is not what we talk about when we talk about ufo conspiracy theories. Those are theories, alien conspiracy theories, that include an element of human conspiracy, usually of government conspiracy. These ideas that there are not only aliens visiting earth, but that the state is in some way involved with those visits is a really prominent Conspiracy Theory. It is not really one, but a multitude of conspiracy theories. Like the kennedy conspiracy that we talked about last week, to just and here and name every ufo Conspiracy Theory would take much longer than we have in this class. Tragically, we will not be talking about the fact that nasa is hiding the existence of planet visitors. Or that we are in secret contact with andromeda and part of a vast, a vast intergalactic war. And we will not be talking about how the earth is hollow and filled with interstellar beings who may or may not have been allied with the nazis in world war ii, depending on who you ask. There may be a few smiles at those ideas. Which is understandable. But these are real ideas that real people fiercely and fully believe in. And we should be clear, before we dig into this too much. As Bridget Brown makes clear in the reading you did for today. Not everyone that believes in ufos, believes in ufo conspiracy theories. Even amongst those that do believe in ufo conspiracy theories, there is a wide variation. We keep coming back to this idea of fringe conspiracy is him fringe conspiracy and that is very much in evidence. It is worth thinking about. That these ufo conspiracy theories are widely treated as something laughable. In fact, serious discussion of them is really an effective cultural taboo. We talked about the labeling of something as conspiracy as a distancing measure. Alien conspiracy theories are possibly one of the most evident examples of the distancing of conspiracy believes from acceptable discourse. And yet, at the same time, even as they are treated as laughable, they are some of the most widely believed conspiracy theories. If we go back to the 1960s, gallup polls find 96 of americans had heard of ufos. 46 believed they were real. 1973, 57 believed that ufos are real. By the 1990s, 71 believe the government is, at least, hiding information about ufos. They may or may not be real but there is definitely more going on there then the government is letting us know. And those numbers remained relatively stable. 2015, poll shows that 56 believed that ufos are real. 45 believed that aliens have actually landed and visited earth, on top of that. To put that into context, 56 believe ufos are real, in that same survey, 57 said that the Big Bang Theory was real. This is very much a widely held belief that is very mainstream. At least, the idea that something is going on with ufos. Even if we narrow it into a specific example, like roswell, a majority of americans will repeatedly say that they are at the very least, unsure whether or not a flying saucer crashed in roswell, new mexico. And we have this odd disconnect between this very, very mainstream idea, this majority idea and yet the way that it is treated within our political and cultural discourse. The idea that weird lights or objects in the sky is something to be concerned about, is nothing new. But then, if you are a serf in 13th century europe, what are you going to think the floating lights in the sky might be . Aliens . Which is . Omens of doom . Any other guesses . God. Devils, witches. Omens. Overwhelmingly, a supernatural explanation. And it is not really until we start to see that enlightenment rationalism supplant these ideas of divine providence, that we move from the supernatural to scientific explanations for these unexplained phenomena. Although, even then, we need to be careful about drawing too wide of a divide between those as we are going to see, the two ideas, the supernatural unscientific, are going to remain intertwined pretty thoroughly. Matthew . 11 of people think ufos are real but dont think aliens have visited earth. I was wondering, are ufos just an unidentified flying object, where is the boundary there . And identified according to who . A lot of things i cant identifying in the sky, but i assume somebody can. This is true, this is. True the ipsos polls, the wording isnt great. The way the poll explains that is that not there is a 11 difference between those who believe ufos are in extraterrestrial phenomena, what gets commonly referred to as the extra terrestrial hypothesis, that ufos are real and alien related. The 11 difference is 56 believe ufos are real, 11 fewer believe that some of those ufos have landed, have had contact with the aliens. Thats the differential playing there. The differential between Something Else going on, that 56 going up to 71 . The idea that there is something going on with this question. That idea, that there is something going on, has a long history. This concern over extraterrestrial contact has a long history. If we go back to 1835, the new york newspaper, the sun, garners major tension in reporting that an astronomer has found life on the moon. Life in the shape of a series of humanoid bat people. Turns out, and surprisingly, that it is a hoax. Im sorry to disappoint anybody who is hoping bat people are living on the moon. It points us to the idea percolating around the 19th century. That gets really evident in the late 19th century, in 1891, when thomas blot alleges that a man from mars appeared in the kitchen of his rural home, and fully endorsed late 19th century democratic socialist utopianism, which was nice for thomas stay here, since he was a believer in such things. Or, in 1896, 1897, where you see a series of unexplained air ships seen in the skies over the west coast. There is a really interesting variety of stories that come out about these air ships. Some of them claim that they see humanoid beings inside then peddling them, to make it go. If that is a spaceship, that is a lot of pedaling. Some allegedly call out to the airship as it goes over, and the airshow calls back down to say they are from mars. Even in the 19th century, people were very fixated on the idea of life from mars. But there is these ideas, right . There is this long history, this long concern about contact with extraterrestrial life, extraterrestrial life visiting us, here on earth. When we talk about modern ufo conspiracism, what we are talking about is the postworld war ii era. These conspiracies paint an alternative history of america from the cold war to the present. What we might call ethno socialities of extraterrestrial conspiracism that reflect very terrestrial concerns about agency, state power, this empowerment, depersonalization. About ideas of expertise and authority. Especially of ideas of skepticism about expertise and authority, and about narratives of progress, whether social or scientific. The modern ufo phenomenon gets kick started after world war ii, in 1947, by this gentleman. Kenneth arnold. People had seen, pilots, pilots had seen unidentified phenomena during world war ii. They get commonly referred to as foo fighters, which is where the bands name comes from. Its not until Kenneth Arnolds sighting in late june of 1947, of what he describes to newspapers as flying discs, what gets widely reported as flying saucers, that the modern ufo phenomena begins. It spreads very quickly. Over the july 4th holiday that year, thousands of men and women contact authorities to report more than 850 sightings of ufos. Thats never been paralleled since. That has never been such a frenzy of ufo sightings as there was over the independence holiday, in 1947. Although sightings remained fairly common through to the early 1950s. And you get pictures like this from new jersey, from 1952, alleging a sighting of unidentified flying objects. And unsurprisingly, you see a variety of efforts to try to explain this phenomenon. Two of the most influential voices in that process are frank scully and donald kehoe. Scully was a writer for the variety magazine who publishes behind the flying saucers in 1950. Where he really focuses in on the story of flying saucers that crash in the american southwest. Where did that crash take place . Not roswell, but thank you for falling into my easy trap. In fact, scully says that the crash in as aztec, new mexico. Neither scully nor kehoe ever mentioned roswell and we are going to talk a little bit later about why that is. Scully says, saucers crash in aztec. Not only do saucers crash, skelly says, but bodies are found. 3 to 4 foot tall alien beings. Really cementing the modern idea of the little green man comes out of sculllys books. He also claims that the saucers come not from mars, but from venus. In the 1950s, a really kind of key time in a mars, venus battle over where these flying saucers come from. Scully loses popularity after 1952 because true magazine publishes an extensive article debunking his entire book, pointing out the fact that most, or really, all of scullys sources are professional con men and really just spending page, after page, making fun of scully for believing the conman and even making fun of how terrible frank scullys writing is. Its a really mean article. And it destroys scullys credibility. But scullys ideas are going to have a really long shelf life. And actually just in recent years, theres been an uptick in people trying to attract some of the roswell tourism away over to as tech and published new books saying that scully was right, saucers really did crash in aztec, new mexico. A little bit more credible, at least at the time, then scully is donald kehoe a retired officer from the marine corps who writes three very popular books. The flying saucers are real, which is released in 1950. Flying saucers from outer space, which comes out in 1953, and the flying saucer conspiracy, in 1955. And kehoe reports conversations and interviews that hes reportedly had with air force officers and specifically air force intelligence officers, to try and substantiate his warnings that first of all, ufos are real and military pilots are encountering them on a semi regular basis. Second of all, he thinks theres a very good chance that the aliens have set up a mothership in orbit of earth and the ufos are coming from that mothership rather than all the way from another planet. And thirdly, that these ufos are most likely from mars. Right, hes not a venus fan. Hes back on the mars train. And whats interesting about kehoe is that he does see a conspiracy. He does see a conspiracy by the military to cover up the reality that earth is being visited by these flying saucers. But, he does not blame them for doing so. For kehoe, what he calls the Silence Group is acting out of a desire to protect National Security and a desire to prevent public hysteria. And while he disagrees with that decision, he sees it as a matter of reasonable disagreement. He doesnt see nefarious motives at work. And that is an idea that is going to change significantly over the 60s and especially coming out of the 70s, into the 80s. But its really easy, at the time, to see the impact of writers like kehoe, who see a conspiracy of silence, but not necessarily a nefarious conspiracy of silence. Right, in 1952, that same year that true magazine is debunking scully, life magazine leads with a big front cover splash of Marilyn Monroe and the headline, there is a case for inter planetary saucers, and life comes down hard in that issue to say that they think something probably is going on with ufos. Less concerned with kind of credibility, but no less influential in putting these ideas into the american consciousness is the glut of alien invasion films in the 1950s. Of course, the classic invasion of the body snatchers, but also invasion of the saucer man, invaders from mars, killers from space, earth versus the flying saucers, and more and there are a couple of interesting elements to be brought out from these films. Not the least of which is a lot of them deal with aliens either taking control of humans minds or of replacing them entirely with simulacra, with lookalikes. And given that these are coming out mid to late 50s, what other fears have weve been talking about that kind of coincides with . Marissa . Communism was spreading into the u. S. Government. Certainly communist infiltration. Yeah, caroline . Brainwashing of korean p. O. W. s . Brainwashing, good. This is very much playing on two simultaneous fears bubbling up in the 1950s. Not just that the communist the communists are infiltrating but that they are infiltrating through this kind of mind control and appearing that with a fear of extraterrestrial threat. It really is an extraterrestrial threats. These films overwhelmingly buy into a donald kehoe styled view about what is happening. The threat is purely extraterrestrial. It is not human. In fact, most of these films, rather than the state being complicit or suspect, government agents, particularly military agents, are the heroes, they are the ones saving us from these extraterrestrial threats. So, what is behind the aliens being a threat . Is there a thought about why they are doing that . Felix harcourt the why of the conspiracy there is not really a single, unifying idea in the 1950s. Other than domination. The plan is always to conquer the world. Why they want to conquer the world is open for interpretation. Their own planet is dying. Maybe it is because they want to make us into slaves. There is some pretty wide latitude there. Good question. So, we see this donald kehoe styled opposite of paranoia at work to some extent. Does anyone remember the word for the opposite of paranoia . Not quite. Security is the middle line. Not quite. What do you call that when a conspiracy is acting for your good and not against you . Not paranoia. But pronoia. This is very much an example of that type of conspiracy thinking. That is evident in another thread of extraterrestrial phenomena that emerges in the 1950s which is an increasing number of people who claim that not only have they seen ufos, but that they have been contacted by aliens. And this is really kicked off by a man named george odamsky. He is the first contactee to publish a book length account of his experience in 1953. And he contradicts virtually Everything Else that has come before him. He says that they are not from mars but venus. And if scully is right about them being from venus, he is wrong about them being short. He says they are about 56, they are humanoid and very beautiful. He also says that they are not a threat. He says the coming was friendly. He is going to lose Popular Support in the 1960s after he claims that he will be leaving any day now for an interplanetary conference on saturn and somehow never quite makes his appointment for that. But, his ideas, his narrative that there are these friendly visitors has very much caught on. And throughout the 1950s, you see this series of encounters with extraterrestrial beings who have seemingly come to warn humanity about our warlike nature, to warn us that Nuclear Weapons will destroy us all. A very pure distillation of common cold war fears at the time. Cold war fears also airing no small resemblance to the 1951 film the day the earth stood still which is basically the exact same plot that he recounts two years later. No really believes him at the time. There is still this pronoia at work in the early 1950s. The idea that the government might be lying to us about it being for our own good. But yes, that aliens are visiting but they are doing it for our own good. That increasingly will take a darker turn as we move out of the 1950s into the 1960s. You start to see not least the governments motives and methods becoming much darker in hiding the truth. That is especially going to become symbolized by the idea of the men in black. And the men in black is an idea that is really kind of more or less put into play by an author called gray barker. He is an interesting guy. Barker makes a pretty good Living Publishing books about supposedly true ufo encounters. But, to friends, privately calls flying saucers a bucket of shit. Very much capitalizing on this trend. But he is going to more or less launch this idea of men in black in his 1956 book they knew too much about flying saucers. A book based on the experiences of a factory clerk from connecticut, Albert Bender who claimed that three men in black suits had approached him and intimidated him into not telling the truth about his alien encounter. Obviously bender had not been that silent given that he was a, able to tell gray barker about it and b, publishes own book about it in 1962 in which he explains it is not the martians, an actual effect he had been taken for a ride in a flying saucer to the south pole by grizzly monster like aliens. Despite the lets be generous and say skepticism which will we might greet Albert Benders story, the idea that government agents and these sinister men in black are working to hide true information really gains popularity, and it really takes off going through the 1960s and 1970s. And there is an interesting phenomenon going on with just the men in black themselves, where quite often they are characterized as old as all human agents of the state, but often times they are given in human or unearthly characteristics, characteristics that very often belie the difference between these scientific and supernatural expressions. And often demonic powers are ascribed to the men in black, walking as if they are not of this earth, not blinking, unnatural powers of persuasion, even up to and including the idea that when they appear, an odor of sulfur also appears. This very literal callback to folklore about demonic appearance. The fact