A new paper, which admits its theories are at the outer limits of reality, is offering a very different reason for unidentified anomalous phenomenon and everything that falls under the umbrella of UAPs.
From the days of little green men onward, the explanation for UAPs has been that there is something, somewhere out there, zipping about in flying saucers and other such things — leading to zillions of theories about aliens that are often interesting, occasionally dopey and always lacking in proof.
Along comes a new paper from researchers at Harvard and Montana Tech of the University of Montana that coined the term “cryptoterrestrial hypothesis,” suggesting that it is an alternative worth exploring — the kind of discussion that might take place when debating the merits of Caitlin Clark on the Olympic team has run dry.
It is worth noting that the Bible is silent on the topic explored in the paper, although the Bible does make it clear that there are spiritual beings that exist but humans can’t see, and they do interact with us.
The paper said its main hypothesis, which it admittedly frames as less likely than extra-terrestrial life forms, is that there are “intelligent beings concealed in stealth” throughout human history.
The four theories presented in the hypothesis are all shots in the dark. According to one, there could be a “technologically advanced ancient human civilization that was largely destroyed long ago (e.g., by flood), but continued to exist in remnant form.”
A second vein of guesswork suggested UAPs and other unexplained behaviors could be laid at the feet of a “technologically advanced non-human civilization consisting of some terrestrial animal which evolved to live in stealth (e.g., underground), perhaps a hominid, or alternatively a species much more distantly related to us (e.g., descendants of unknown, intelligent dinosaurs).”
What’s a good theory, though, without some version of little green men?
Option three to explain what cannot be explained is that Earth is home to “[f]ormer extraterrestrial or extratempestrial cryptoterrestrials. Extraterrestrial aliens or our intertemporal descendants who ‘arrived’ on Earth from elsewhere in the cosmos or from the human future, respectively, and concealed themselves in stealth.”
Do you believe aliens live among us?
There is one final category for those who really like Merlin. The paper dubbed its final group of theoretical beings “Magical Cryptoterrestrials.”
They are, it said, “[e]ntities which are less like homegrown aliens and more like earthbound angels, relating to the world inhabited by humans in ways that (at least from our present perspective) are less technological than magical, who are known in European languages by names like fairies, elves, nymphs, etc.”
“The principal weakness of” the final category, the paper noted, “is its utter strangeness, particularly for readers schooled to limit themselves to modes of explanation within the bounds of, say, the standard model of physics. While belief in extraterrestrials is tenable, belief in (something like) fairies is simply not a live option for many scientists.”
The paper went out of its way to note that these are explanations designed to fill a gap where nothing else fits.
“We entertain them here because some aspects of UAP are strange enough that they seem to call for unconventional explanations,” the paper said.
“It may be exceedingly improbable, but hopefully this paper has shown it should nevertheless be kept on the table as we seek to understand the ongoing empirical mystery of UAP,” the paper continued.
The website Futurism said the paper, which noted that the civilization it theorizes to exist could live on the Moon, was “bound to raise eyebrows in the scientific community.”
But the paper said the idea is discussion, saying unexplained events “tend to fall into two classes: a conventional terrestrial explanation (e.g., human-made technology), or an extraterrestrial explanation (i.e., advanced civilizations from elsewhere in the cosmos).”
“However, there is also a third minority class of hypothesis: an unconventional terrestrial explanation, outside the prevailing consensus view of the universe,” the paper said. “This is the ultraterrestrial hypothesis, which includes as a subset the ‘cryptoterrestrial’ hypothesis, namely the notion that UAP may reflect activities of intelligent beings concealed in stealth here on Earth (e.g., underground), and/or its near environs (e.g., the moon), and/or even ‘walking among us’ (e.g., passing as humans).”
“Although this idea is likely to be regarded sceptically by most scientists, such are the nature of some UAP that we argue this possibility should not be summarily dismissed.”
The paper referenced comments from former Republican Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin.
Gallagher last year was commenting on a hypothesis that UAPs could be from a civilization that is part of the future, according to Newsweek.
He said a different explanation could be “as opposed to being us from the future, it could actually be an ancient civilization that’s just been hiding here and is suddenly showing itself.”
