How can we tell stars or ufo apart?

Well, here the thing, while watering my mom gardens at like 3am in the morning (all i can say is, its much cooler at night during the summer).

Anyways, I was looking up at the sky, and at first, I could only see a couple stars, maybe like 20 at most...and then all a sudden, with my sensitive peripheral vision, I noticed sudden changes in the sky, I notice, what I believe to be stars, flickering, and and about 10 mins later, alot of small flickering spec of light.

The odd thing was, I some would disappear and reappear in the same spot again, but as a tough critic, I probably lost track of it and found it again.

But, the thing that I question most was can some stars flicker red, orange, white, and blue? I mean I know most stars appear to be white or blue specs of light, but does it ever flicker and change color? Oh yea..I'm pretty sure its wasnt a plane..cuz like I said before I found it in the same spot..and it wasn't moving? And I know plane when I see one, they always make noise anyways...

There are Ufological objects that could , resemble a star.

However , if you didn't notice any obvious movements, that would indicate the object wasn't a star with a fixed position in the sky , it would most likely have simply been a star.

Our eye's cannot stay focused on one tiny spot , such as a star , and stars can appear to slightly dance around. Try it tonight with any star , and it will seem to move around a bit.

And yes stars can "Twinkle " different colors.

Edit: skyblueff0,

Hope that helps some. The best thing for you to do would be to spend time looking at the sky , and make yourself familar with whats normal. ( The way stars look , how your eye's play tricks , what satelites look like, what shooting stars look like, how aircraft look at night, ect.)


[edit on 21-7-2005 by lost_shaman]

Originally posted by lost_shaman....And yes stars can "Twinkle " different colors.

As shaman rightly point out, stars twinkle due to the state of the atmosphere that the light passes through. Usually, this is most pronounced nearer the horizon rather than near the zenith (the area of sky immediately above your head when you look straight up).

Have a look at Why Stars twinkle for a detailed explanation.

Let's look at this from another perspective, given that UFOs are unindentified after all how do you know that stars are NOT UFO and in the process of checking you out.... think about it

[edit on 21-7-2005 by Perfect stranger]

UFOs disguise themselves as stars, remaining motionless for hours as they watch you and read your brain waves.

Originally posted by dave_54
UFOs disguise themselves as stars, remaining motionless for hours as they watch you and read your brain waves.

You have any proof of that dave?? It's a rather rash statement IMO. Still, convince me and I will become a convert....

YOu are just observing normal scintillation of starlight from air currents in the Earths atmosphere, this gives the effect of the stars twinkling but also changing colour. Stars actually are different colours, but the light levels in the night sky are so low that only the rod receptors in your eye can detect them, so this gives you the illusion that they are all white. I think UFO's really would stand out from the stars.

YOu are just observing normal scintillation of starlight from air currents in the Earths atmosphere, this gives the effect of the stars twinkling but also changing colour. Stars actually are different colours, but the light levels in the night sky are so low that only the rod receptors in your eye can detect them, so this gives you the illusion that they are all white. I think UFO's really would stand out from the stars.

I've seen something similar to this actually two seperate times. It looked exactly like a star only it was moving through the sky...it wasnt a helicopter or plane (as far as i know) because they have flashing lights on the wings/make noise/wouldnt be flying that high. We thought it could have been a comet or shooting star but we saw about five and they remained stationary then moved..then stopped again etc. Im not saying this was an alien spacecraft but i cant think of what else it would have been...both these seen while deliberatly looking at the stars so not big events..we wouldnt have noticed if we hadnt been looking as they were so far away (like a star). On the second time we saw these things (we saw several the first time and only one the second time) this one moved, stopped, moved again then disappeard - well it got fainter and fainter very quickly.

thanks guys...i will take both perspective into hand, but yea i knew there was a scientific reason behind this..so thanks

Originally posted by Perfect stranger
Let's look at this from another perspective, given that UFOs are unindentified after all how do you know that stars are NOT UFO and in the process of checking you out.... think about it

[edit on 21-7-2005 by Perfect stranger]

Well - we have spectra on them (nothing funny in most) as well as measurements of the various forms of IR and UV they give off. Quite typical of thermonuclear reactions as would be the case in stars....