The Cell Phone Paradox

So I would imagine that most of the people that post on this board would already be aware of the fermi paradox. Just in case you need a refresher, here is a good brief description from wikipedia:

The Fermi paradox is the apparent contradiction between high estimates of the probability of the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations and the lack of evidence for, or contact with, such civilizations. The age of the universe and its vast number of stars suggest that if the Earth is typical, extraterrestrial life should be common. In an informal discussion in 1950, the physicist Enrico Fermi questioned why, if a multitude of advanced extraterrestrial civilizations exist in the Milky Way galaxy, evidence such as spacecraft or probes is not seen. A more detailed examination of the implications of the topic began with a paper by Michael H. Hart in 1975, and it is sometimes referred to as the Fermi-Hart paradox. Other common names for the same phenomenon are Fermi's question ("Where are they?"

Now I have always had what I thought was a pretty straight forward answer to Fermi's question of "Where are they?" They are here. To me the thousands of UFO sightings that are reported every year all across the globe is all the evidence we should need to dispel the Fermi Paradox. However I have had somewhat of a change of heart and with that have come up with a new question along the lines of Fermi and his Paradox.

Considering the rapid increase in image capturing and video recording equipment and the pretty much ubiquitous nature of said technology nowadays, "Where is the Proof." I think we can aptly call this The Cell Phone Paradox. Considering that almost every man woman and child in the developed world carries a multi - megapixel camera with them everywhere they go, why haven't we gotten and definitive proof that UFO's are indeed alien spacecraft? As unlikely a scenario as it might be, are all the UFO sightings that get reported each year really all just cases of mis-identification of ordinary airborne objects?

well for me all the cellphone cams are just a step back...

and not forward...cell phone cams are more useless than old VHS camcorders...

thats why we spammed with useless blurry night spots in the sky

ever seen a UFO video taken on a cell-phone?

They're worse than useless.

reply to post by RedBird


Not even a video, just a clear picture. I have just been really thinking about it lately and it struck me as odd and somewhat unbelievable, that in the age of ubiquitous cell phone cameras, no UFO has ever flown low enough for anyone to snap a picture.

There have been so many UFO sightings where the person who saw the UFO has detailed descriptions about shape, size, lights, and many other details. In order for these people to have this kind of detail in their reports, the UFO had to fly low enough for them to get a good view. Now before say 10 years ago it wasn't rational for someone to have a camera on them all the time and that was a good reason we didn't have any really clear pictures of UFO's. Nowadays people have high quality digital cameras on their persons 24 hours a day. If UFO's really are alien spacecraft.. why hasn't someone captured a clear image of one yet?

Because we all know that photographic evidence is not good enough for most people. THE only way people will believe is to see with their own eyes. When they do see it with their own eyes, they then automatically get labeled as nut jobs, crazies, ....etc.

Originally posted by wisintel
reply to post by RedBird

 

Not even a video, just a clear picture. I have just been really thinking about it lately and it struck me as odd and somewhat unbelievable, that in the age of ubiquitous cell phone cameras, no UFO has ever flown low enough for anyone to snap a picture.

There have been so many UFO sightings where the person who saw the UFO has detailed descriptions about shape, size, lights, and many other details. In order for these people to have this kind of detail in their reports, the UFO had to fly low enough for them to get a good view. Now before say 10 years ago it wasn't rational for someone to have a camera on them all the time and that was a good reason we didn't have any really clear pictures of UFO's. Nowadays people have high quality digital cameras on their persons 24 hours a day. If UFO's really are alien spacecraft.. why hasn't someone captured a clear image of one yet?

I don't think you are looking hard enough. There are plenty of clear pictures out there. The only problem is, they are so clear that people instantly default to "it must be photoshopped/hoaxed, case closed" If the image is blurry then it's clouds, birds, insects, planes, missiles...case closed. Go out and watch the sky for yourself. If you managed to capture a UFO in a picture, bring it here and you will see how quickly the debunkers claim HOAX!

Im from the UK and i dont have a camera phone anymore.
Didnt see the point in having a phone with a crappy camera and a load of other crappy useless things on it to be honest lol.
Ive gone back to an old Nokia 3200...ive had it for at least 7 years and i can still call people on it

Camera phones tend to be pretty naff....i mean the camera itself is a cheap tacky gimmick for the most part.
I own a 12mp digital camcorder....but i dont carry it everywhere so even if i were to see another ufo chances are i wouldnt have a camera to catch it

The cameras on phones are very limited....i mean they are useless in some lighting and many of them have no zoom...or its a digital zoom which just distortes the image further.

While the premise of your idea seems reasonable, it is flawed. You assume that all beings are exactly in the same phase of 3d as we are, and are therefor subject to being photographed via our primitive recording instruments - not true. You also assume that said beings want to be photographed - also not likely to be true. You assume that the person taking the photo can overrule any other being and take their photo without permission - since this isn't true in America it is probably not true when in connection with others. Lastly, you assume that anything not of the earth 3d is obvious to the eyes, therefor obvious to the camera. The eyes often can't see things right in front of them, as they are exceedingly poor processors of information. To understand this, think the color blind tests were a person is shown a multitude of colors but can only see shades of gray, if a non-3d-human was a color to a color blind person they would not see them, therefor not be able to photo them.

The often heard battle cry for those who "know" we are alone is "why don't they just show themselves?" Given the treatment members of earth get from their own it is hardly a surprise that those who occupy, or can occupy, the earth 3d realm would avoid being seen - the result would not be worth it on any level.

Well, I also think that many people even don't record these events. I, am one of those.
I know my mobile suck at filming the skies, and when its dark, its impossible.
Many people are probably also fearing that they will be ridiculed by friends/family if they begin to videotape it...

Its a shame, I know.. But you need to think that, even if they got a mobile cam, they probably wont videotape it..
And, also, if somebody records it, where should they go with the video? I don't think many people will upload such things.

the alien and ufo topic, is still like "oh please, why do you even care about it?", as many people think.
I don't got any friends, who even care about it. Even if there is a viral video of a clear UFO pops up somewhere, they even don't consider watching it...

People simply don't care (that is what I have met in my country, I don't know about you)

reply to post by wisintel


I personally believe that the civilizations are spaced out far enough that one will never reach another. I'm not religious or anything, just seems like a nice practical explanation.

I believe that the answer to the problem, or paradox, is not so much of an answer as it is adding an additional variable into the equation.

The chances for life arising from non-living components is astronomical (no pun) - yet when you consider all the other stars in the several hundred billion galaxies that exists - the improbability of life developing not only becomes more possible, but quite probable.

ASSUMING that life elsewhere would develop at more or less the same rate as on our planet, we can deduce the following:
Either life has NOT developed anywhere else OR
if it has it could possibly be still in an early developmental phase such as the Pre-Cambrian (sp?) and the hardest decisions made on the planet so far have been whether to venture out of the water or not...OR...
It HAS developed elsewhere and they are just in the same proverbial boat we are in finding a way to get anywhere else in the universe in a more timely fashion
OR even that they ARE more advanced than we are and there is just NO way discovered yet to cruise the cosmos "as-seen-on-tv"

Personally, I think there may be (or HAS been) life out there even quite similar to what we know. They may not have had the great fortune of surviving any probable cataclysmic events - or may have been affected differently by them. Whether they are not present on earth because of their lack of appropriate technology, or evolution quite literally still has them stuck in the mud - is up to speculation.
Now, there also could be a race two million more years advanced than we - and simply haven't appeared because they regard us in the same manner we would regard a tribe of chimps on the savannas poking sticks into termite holes. We would be just too far behind for them to hope of having any sort of meaningful interaction with us besides startling us out of our wits. And that's just with the assumption that they would be friendly enough to let us live.

As with anything I write, I am most definitely wrong about something. No real need to point it out. Thanks.

nice

yeah, digital cameras suck..

for all we know it helps them stay invisible.. I've had some things that were hard to focus on, when it really shouldn't have been.

With the present mindset that exists, where every possible mundane possibility is explored before even considering that something might be otherwordly, pictures of ANY kind are worse than useless.

In a nutshell, anything can be explained away as something else... Whether the explanation is the actual one or not doesn't get a look-in, as long as said explanation conforms to the mundane and normal

End result is... If you were lucky enough to HONESTLY be able to photograph yourself in front of an honest to goodness alien craft, with it's occupants either side of you, you'd get the following reactions (or variations thereof)

Hoaxer

You gotta be joking ... It's a combo of CGI and a bunch of friends in costume

You superimposed yourself on some out-take from some movie ... it's a hoax

Somebody would have seen this if it was real, and it'd be all over the news... It's fake

It's too good to be true, so it can't be.

And so on... Just Insert excuse/explanation here....


You would then discover that (on the strength of those assessments) whenever the case came up again, someone would point to the thread containing those reactions and triumphantly scream, 'Hoax, and already debunked here!'

You would know it happened, but your photograph would not prove it.

Photographs of any description, let alone low-quality phone camera ones, are worse than useless... Nobody is ever going prove the existence of aliens or alien craft with a camera, because no one would accept it EVER at face value, regardless of quality.

So essentially, the fact everyone and their mother owns a camera with a phone is irrelevant.

Also the fact that not everyone is proof or S&F hungry. When I see these things I just watch them. I don't run for my camera, of which I have several. Sometimes seeing these things is just an experience, I'm sure others see it that way too. It can be personal. When people say "Yeah but everyone wants to capture the smoking gun footage!" or "My son trawls the internet every day 24/7 hoping for the big scoop" - I say crap - we are NOT all like that!

If it wasn't for the fact the ones I've seen move extremely fast making them virtually impossible to capture on any kind of film/picture anyway, it's just the fact that I'm sure many people simply can't be arsed to try and record what they're seeing. You know the saying "Blink and you'll miss it", well, the same applies with "Run in to get your camera".

People need to chill out with recordings. Sure, it makes for some great threads here and on UFO websites, but it's more important for people to have a personal experience and soak it in, and forget about trying to get it on video and get it seen en-mass. That method has, as others have said, little viability on the net anyway because people will debunk or whatnot. Sometimes the personal accounts are far more interesting than any of the videos circulating. But as with this subject, it really is for individuals to explore. It's not good to expect to login one day and have all the proof laid out for you, (even though it already is).

On the flip side, when IR is at a consumer level - we will have a massive increase in footage/pictures, but bearing in mind it's currently expensive, mostly, to get any pro IR equipment - people aren't going to fork out for it just to bring others proof. Well, except A. Murray. But she's whack.

Oh, and it's not really related, but I have a new theory. If you can see it from behind glass or it's not directly above you, it's not an extra terrestrial craft. Back to point, I don't agree with the Fermi paradox. It's not particularly 21st century thinking.

My point is this: Someone witnessing a giant spaceship over them in full view is far less likely to grab a camera than someone who's observing an orange light above the distant hills. The first person would have the better evidence but as they are having the better experience it's far less likely they'll be doing anything more than pooping themselves a little.

reply to post by wisintel


So when someone posts a cell phone shot of a other-than-typical craft hovering or moving in the air you want somehow to ignore tha possibility of what it could be if open-minded, and judge it by your and Sagan's standards of "Naw, it can't be!"

You, of course, ignore the Drake equation that absolutely predicts ETs out there. Sagan always said, "Yes, they are out there, but they can't get here," but new thinking about the speed of light and possible types of locomotion seems to be dimming that harsh view that he presented at every opportunity.

Cellphone cams are shaky, blurry, #ty...They only produce bad videos...

Originally posted by markymint
Also the fact that not everyone is proof or S&F hungry. When I see these things I just watch them. I don't run for my camera, of which I have several. Sometimes seeing these things is just an experience, I'm sure others see it that way too. It can be personal. When people say "Yeah but everyone wants to capture the smoking gun footage!" or "My son trawls the internet every day 24/7 hoping for the big scoop" - I say crap - we are NOT all like that!

If it wasn't for the fact the ones I've seen move extremely fast making them virtually impossible to capture on any kind of film/picture anyway, it's just the fact that I'm sure many people simply can't be arsed to try and record what they're seeing. You know the saying "Blink and you'll miss it", well, the same applies with "Run in to get your camera".

People need to chill out with recordings. Sure, it makes for some great threads here and on UFO websites, but it's more important for people to have a personal experience and soak it in, and forget about trying to get it on video and get it seen en-mass. That method has, as others have said, little viability on the net anyway because people will debunk or whatnot. Sometimes the personal accounts are far more interesting than any of the videos circulating. But as with this subject, it really is for individuals to explore. It's not good to expect to login one day and have all the proof laid out for you, (even though it already is).

On the flip side, when IR is at a consumer level - we will have a massive increase in footage/pictures, but bearing in mind it's currently expensive, mostly, to get any pro IR equipment - people aren't going to fork out for it just to bring others proof. Well, except A. Murray. But she's whack.

Oh, and it's not really related, but I have a new theory. If you can see it from behind glass or it's not directly above you, it's not an extra terrestrial craft. Back to point, I don't agree with the Fermi paradox. It's not particularly 21st century thinking.

edit on 17-11-2010 by markymint because: (no reason given)

Are you S&F hungry? Because that post surely deserves one!

S&F, couldn't agree more with you!

Ha, when I am - you'll see my blurry photo of a dot next to a cloud on this forum.

Or, a 7 second clip of someone's christmas tree lights.

thousands of sightings. hundreds of reported abductions, animal mutilation, contactees, and yet not one sliver of alien gum wrappers, not one alien loose screw that fell off the alien tailpipe that was being held on with alien duck tape. not one broken shoe string, oil spot, lost alien cell phone, not one misplaced screwdriver, or forgotten hammer, no discarded alien food wrappers, not even crumbs. i can only come to the most logical conculsion. The aliens visiting earth are the cleanest,most anal retentive, unforgetful race of being I have ever come across! They truely are advanced! The idea that maybe they havent ever visited the earth? why thats just crazy!