A Harvard scientist and a Pentagon official have just released a draft paper speculating that aliens may be visiting our solar system. They also send small boats to explore the planets. The paper was drafted by Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb and Sean Kirkpatrick, director of the Office of Solving Oddities in All Fields at the Pentagon. The US Department of Defense established this office in July 2022 to study “interesting things.”
in the research paper, Physical constraints on unidentified atmospheric phenomena, the authors said that it is possible that an extraterrestrial spaceship is in the galactic region adjacent to Earth, and it sends boats to explore nearby planets. They also said that these boats are similar to the spacecraft sent by NASA to explore unknown regions of space.
Loeb, a Harvard scientist, has previously spoken of the possibility of extraterrestrial life several times. In September 2022, an astronomer suggested that a meteorite at the bottom of the South Pacific Ocean could, in fact, be hiding alien technology. He is also widely known for his ‘Oumuamua research.
Oumuamua was first detected in 2017 by astronomers who initially thought it was a comet. However, another study called the culprit theory into question. ‘Oumuamua is a cigar-shaped cosmic body from outside our solar system, but its shape is atypical for comets.
Furthermore, ‘Oumuamua was accelerating away from the sun. Which led the Harvard scientist to speculate that it might have been an alien spaceship. Coincidentally, just months before ‘Oumuamua came close to Earth, a small meteorite called IM2 about three feet across collided with the planet.
IM2 had nothing to do with ‘Oumuamua, but the coincidence inspired the Harvard scientist to consider the possibility that the artificial interstellar object could be a mothership that released many small vehicles during its close pass to Earth. This is an operational build not very different from NASA missions.
In their draft paper, Loeb and Kirkpatrick suggested that these small craft would be able to reach Earth for exploration undetected, as they are likely too small to reflect the sunlight necessary for telescopes to see them.
They wrote: “With proper design, these small craft will reach Earth or other planets in the solar system for exploration, where the mother craft will pass within a fraction of the separation between the Earth and the sun – just as ‘Oumuamua did. Astronomers won’t be able to notice the jet skies because they don’t reflect enough sunlight for current survey telescopes to notice.”
They also suggested that if these vehicles were properly equipped, they could slow enough when re-entering Earth’s atmosphere to avoid burning up. After that, they could simply explore freely after they landed. In the draft paper, the scientists also put forward the theory that aliens would likely want to explore rocky planets with atmospheres — Venus, Earth and Mars. However, Earth would be particularly tempting, given the large amount of water on our planet.
They wrote that the alien civilization that created these vehicles would not need to be on board the mother ship. Loeb and Kirkpatrick also made the point that this civilization might not exist anymore. Since most of the stars in the solar system formed billions of years before the sun.
In this sense, a habitable planet with intelligent life may have been sending vehicles hundreds of thousands of years before Earth formed. Loeb likened this search to “checking our mailbox for any packages that might have accumulated over time there, even if the senders are not alive anymore.”
Of course, this is all theoretical, and the Harvard scientist’s views have long been controversial in the astronomy community. In fact, recent research indicates that ‘Oumuamua may have completely natural origins. The paper, written by Loeb and Kirkpatrick, is still under review. But that doesn’t mean their theories should be dismissed entirely either. All of this plays into what Loeb called “Oumuamua’s wager,” following the philosophical argument of Pascal’s wager.
In the seventeenth century, Pascal’s wager suggested that a rational person should live his life as if God existed. Because if God existed, he would have led a good life and been given a place in Heaven. And if God did not exist, he would have nothing to lose.
Oumuamua’s wager suggests, then, that it might be worth believing Oumuamua to be an alien spaceship. Just to open our minds to the possibility of extraterrestrial life.
Reem El Shazly
