Disbelievers

If you had an encounter with a UFO would you tell anybody?
How's your credibility? Who would believe you? Family members? Friends?

Imagine that you belong to a tribe of South American natives in the early 16th century.
You are standing on the eastern shore gazing over the Atlantic ocean.
Suddenly, on the water near the horizon, you see four rectalinear shapes.
They appear dark brownish. They each have three or four tall slender branchless tree trunks attatched to them that have whiteish cloudlike billows impailed upon them. These impaled cloudlike things seem to be dragging these rectangle things slowly southward. You watch in amazement until they drift out of sight.

All excited, you run back to your village and proceed to tell your fellow tribesmen of
your sighting. How do they react? I think they would accuse you of chewing too many coca leaves, or tell you that it was just swamp gas, and probably rename you 'Klattu' (that's the South American native word for 'nut-case'). How alienating.
Shoulda' kept yer yap shut.
Meanwhile, a few weeks later, Magellan traverses the straits that now bear his name.

Nice post, it puts a lot of things in perspective.

err no it doesn't...

Firstly those ships eventually let to many more who pillaged the entire continent destroying civilizations and enslaving people.

Does this tie in at all?

Secondly those ships were made by fellow humans, who were just more technically advanced than the native, still the same species, just higher up the technology tree. Still fellow humans.

Thirdly, maybe a better senario would be this...

Native sees sun being swallowed up by moon. Fears that the "sun eater" has arrived, and performs magical spells (usually involving sacrificing virgins (except in Australia where they can't find any)) to make it go away.

After the spells work and the sun returns to the sky the native knows that the "sun eater" is real and that he has the power to drive it off.

Native uses the same spells the next time the moon tries to eat the sun and the fact of the sun eater existance is established.

No one questions the reality of the sun eater except some native geek who says its just natural.

Villagers consider the native geek thinks too much anyway and after accusing him of blaspheming their sun eater god beat him to death. Thus ignorance is perpetuated making "facts" from cultural misconceptions.

Man NC, you really have to start thinking outside of the box.

I can't believe I actually quoted that.

Check out Aliens and UFO's. It comes up that aliens are travelers from the future.

I think that this was a damn good analogy. Europe = space. Definately WAY advanced to the New World.

What's the problem here?

Gah... in keeping with the metaphoric theme of this thread, may I suggest that you're both wandering well astray of reality lane? While it's always nice to ponder how deep the rabbit hole goes, you're failing to see the forest for the trees. Isn't the question not how deep the hole is, but whether human nature dictates that we find out, regardless of the consequences?

A wonderful statement centrist. Indeed we are failing to see the forest for the trees, especially the trees that are in the rabbit holes. I think I did the first poster a disservice in misinterpretating his story.

Indeed I took the first metaphor about the native seeing the ships as an example of people seeing UFO's.

However I see now that it can totally fit in with what I was trying to say in my own metaphor, that what the native saw were just man made, (or in my story) natural occurances. Totally explainable in the world oat that time. one person saw some people in a technology he didn't recognice, another saw a natural event. Both misinterpretated the natural scene before their eyes, (well my one did, maybe the other one didn't)

[edit on 18-11-2005 by Netchicken]