UFO Buffs: Maybe We Were Wrong

British UFO group to address the decline in sightings
By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 5, 2012 2:43 PM CST
UFO Buffs: Maybe We Were Wrong
This photo circa March 2004 shows a doughnut-shaped phenomenon photographed by a retired RAF officer and sent to his old bosses tasked with investigating UFOs.   (AP Photo/The National Archives/PA Wire)

Maybe the truth isn't out there after all? A British UFO organization has planned a meeting to discuss whether the issue has faded with the lack of proven sightings, the Telegraph reports. "It is certainly a possibility that in ten years time, it will be a dead subject," says Dave Wood, who chairs the group—the Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena. "We look at these things on the balance of probabilities and this area of study has been ongoing for many decades."

After all, reported UFO cases have plummeted 96% since 1988—when people started evaluating sightings over the Internet and asking why witnesses hadn't recorded them with a video camera. Now, says Wood, most of the group's discussions revolve around conspiracy theories like Roswell that are never fully confirmed or denied. Interestingly, the group includes both believers and skeptics—although president Lionel Fanthorpe has argued that King Arthur was an extraterrestrial who defended Earth from invading aliens. (More extraterrestrial life stories.)

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