Aliens And Atomic Power

Last night's UFO Hunters focused on the theory that aliens are closely monitoring our most advanced scientific installations. Historically, there are clusters of UFO reports centered on such places, as well as around military bases that housed nuclear weapons. Roswell, for example, was home to a bomber group that would have delivered atomic bombs, had that become necessary immediately after World War II.

The notion that aliens capable of interstellar travel would be overly concerned about atomic explosions on Earth, however, is probably too human-centric. Cracking the atom was a monumental achievement for mankind, but it still left us centuries away from being able to leave our own solar system. There was no cause for interstellar panic. The notion that such an advanced society would dedicate such resources to keep ongoing track of human scientific progress probably also gives us too much credit.

There is a line of thought dating back to the so-called alien contactees of the 1950s that says aliens are here to keep us from destroying ourselves through nuclear war, pollution, or whatever. Under that theory, aliens don't fear our gathering capability, they just want to channel it down useful paths. Of course, the "aliens" who interacted with the contactees were themselves very human in form, and said they came from places like Venus and Saturn.