The Lighter Side of Alien Lights and the Law
The UFO phenomenon elicits images of a highly efficient and technologically advanced civilization where nothing goes wrong, and no policy endangers the sanctity of a continued presence of Earth by extraterrestrial visitors. And yet there are a few problems with UFOs if they are to maintain their secrecy. Why, for example, do these races design triangular craft with incredible stealth technology, and then decide to put bright flashing lights at the corners of them? The answer may tell us just as much about ourselves as the aliens in question.
On Earth aircraft have lights for a reason. In any weather conditions it’s always easier to see an object emitting light for obvious reasons. And so aircraft have for decades implemented the use of flashing lights of different colors to indicate to other flyers attempting to negotiate the crowded skies to reduce the possibility of a collision. As a matter of legality, all aircraft above a certain size must possess these lights or they cannot legally take off. But what if the government were to suddenly make contact with an extraterrestrial race visiting us from the stars?
If they were a benevolent and lawful race of beings, and a safety authority official were to approach them, he might ask just how many of these craft were navigating the skies at any time and then upon learning say something along the lines of, “Well that’s going to be a problem. You’re going to need to put lights on those craft right away.” Despite the alien visitor’s protests, the safety authority could then cite Earth law and declare their craft a potentially banned flying hazard if they didn’t comply. While an alien race would no doubt not be obligated on their own to do this, if they were part of a far larger administration that recognized the native laws of planets they were visiting, such a race might be pressured to comply even if it did call into question the effectiveness of their stealth technology. Not wishing to lose their permit to orbit Earth, the aliens may grudgingly comply with the laws and the nighttime UFO phenomenon would have been born.
Of course this is a comical approach to the UFO phenomenon, but all too often when studying these alien craft we lose sight of the potential fallibility of any alien visitation program and the fact that they may have to answer to the same bureaucratic imperitives we suffer from on Earth. And after a thousand year head start on our civilization, there may prove to be some things you simply cannot fully rid your civilization of. After all, these very same problems have been with the human race throughout history with no sign of declining. And it’s difficult to imagine further increases in the complexity of government will result in the elimination of these sorts of regulations.
While it’s still purely speculation and can in no way be proven, it does make a few suggestions about alien civilization. If they were adhering to some sort of safety regulation, it would mean either they are independently lawful and willing to follow human aviation guidelines to a certain extent to avoid crash and injury or they are taking orders from a higher power that is. How then would we use this to bring us closer to disclosure? Simply have a law stating that no visiting species from another planet would be allowed legal access to Earth’s airspace without first acknowledging their presence in the skies via live television address. Just don’t expect too many eager letters from public officials back based on this theory if you propose such a law. It is, after all, entirely speculative.
