[Music]
while there has been something of a rush
on them since the mid-20th century ufo
sightings aren't a recent phenomenon
there are claims throughout history of
strange flying objects in the sky with
some interpretations of even prehistoric
cave paintings suggesting that they
seemingly show ufo candidates from tens
of thousands of years ago naturally
there's a lot of room for both
speculation and skepticism here but
still the idea that ancient humans might
have been spotting ufos much as we do
leads to another big question how far
back do the claims really go
this is unveiled and today we're
answering the extraordinary question
have aliens been monitoring us from the
beginning of time do you need the big
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first things first if there really are
aliens hiding out somewhere in the
universe and spying on us from a
distance without ever making contact
then it would at least solve some
important much debated problems like the
fermi paradox for instance which
famously asks why is it that we've yet
to make contact with alien life despite
the overwhelming odds that it exists
when it comes down to it as enrico fermi
himself is said to have asked where are
they all there are a number of possible
answers to this question maybe there
just so happens to be zero alien life
alive at the exact same time we are or
maybe faster than light travel doesn't
exist and although aliens do exist
they're too far away in space to ever
visit us or perhaps there are and were
whole other civilizations but such is
the way of the universe they either have
already met or will inevitably meet
their demise before making contact with
anyone else
failing all of that however there's one
other possibility that many ufologists
believe that aliens know we're here but
they don't want us to know that they're
here they're hiding from us but they're
watching us too and ufo sightings the
really good ones are instances when the
veil slips and the truth is revealed and
if that were true then it's really quite
easy to imagine that they might have
been around since at least the emergence
of modern humans on earth seeing as
we've been here for about a blink of an
eye in cosmological terms the next
question then would be why why watch us
without making themselves known well
let's consider a scenario where we
humans have just discovered a planet
filled with alien life forms about as
intelligent as the great apes or even
ancient hominins what would we do
there's some reason to think that we
wouldn't make contact with them either
just descending down upon them could
well trigger a crisis but with language
barriers to negotiate alien atmospheres
to survive in and the possibility of
cross-contamination to avoid if an alien
presence were to have discovered earth
then at any point in its 4.5 billion
year history it could be keeping its
distance out of caution but it's also
extremely unlikely that if the roles
were reversed we would just leave the
newly discovered planet alone the amount
of money research and knowledge that
we'd have to spend to find it would be
too great and the amount of money
research and knowledge that we could
gain by just watching the alien
creatures on it could be astronomical
too the curiosity would be hard to
contain so one direction we could take
would be to leave cameras or probes
orbiting the planet unobtrusive machines
of some kind so as not to influence how
this alternative version of intelligent
life develops and from this point of
view the zoo hypothesis the broad idea
that aliens are observing us from afar
like zoo animals maybe doesn't seem so
strange and perhaps neither does the
suggestion that passing aliens might
have left something behind to watch us
with enter the bracewell probe a
hypothetical spacecraft hypothetically
created by aliens to orbit around
unsuspecting planets the proposed probes
are named after the astronomer and
engineer ronald bracewell who first
imagined their existence in the 1960s
from his point of view seti or the
search for extraterrestrial intelligence
wasn't efficient back then it focused on
the sending out of radio waves and then
just hoping to hear something back but
instead bracewell thought we should be
sending out orbital machines to other
planets and using them to both search
for signs of alien life and begin
communications if or when we found them
there are several potential benefits to
this approach it enables long-distance
monitoring it would allow us to pass
clearer signals to other planets it
lessens the danger of contaminating
another world and lessens the danger of
revealing our own position in the
universe too soon a bracewell probe
isn't a simple device to build however
it requires interstellar technology and
advanced artificial intelligence capable
of initiating contact with an alien
species if needed thanks to the
incredible rate of modern tech
development it's perhaps not impossible
for us to envisage building one but
still we humans have much work to do
before we have bracewell probes for
ourselves especially ones capable of
visiting planets and objects outside of
the solar system another more
specialized although still hypothetical
option then would be a von neumann probe
a particular class of space probe
suggested by the mid 20th century
physicist john von neumann von neumann
probes are an imagined version of a
self-replicating spacecraft that can
gather materials from space and build
clones of itself and if an advanced
enough civilization were to create one
of these there's really nowhere that
would be off limits to them
theoretically they'd need only send out
one probe from their home planet and
watch it duplicate across the stars
equally from our point of view if von
neumann probes were possible then even
more so than with bracewell probes it
suddenly seems not unlikely that one
might have reached earth by now and it's
perhaps little wonder that conspiracy
theories abound the most famous example
of which is the black knight satellite a
probable piece of space junk floating
above earth but an object that's claimed
by some to be a sinister alien device
that's been watching over us for some 13
000 years
for more on the black knight take a look
at our other recent video but perhaps
all of this is all a little too close to
home after all if there really was an
alien artifact watching us then it
wouldn't necessarily need to be in
near-earth orbit all the time
a 2019 paper titled looking for lurkers
by the physicist james benford for
example brought the problem up to date
with contemporary study benford called
on seti and other organizations to
search for alien intelligence in what
are known as co-orbital objects objects
including asteroids in the solar system
that we know routinely head towards
earth with benford suggesting that some
of them in particular are little studied
could these be the ideal candidates for
hiding something like a probe
rather than positioning one close to the
planet you're watching and risking that
it's eventually found but finally in the
event that aliens really are watching us
from near or far then we have another
problem on the horizon if we were to
discover a probe then will we have
automatically alerted the aliens
controlling it to the fact that we know
about them and could that be bad news
in that scenario we'd certainly be
vulnerable having watched us since
potentially the beginning of time the
aliens would know everything there is to
know about humanity they'll have seen us
transform from primitive beings to
interplanetary travelers and they'll
know all our capabilities and
shortcomings they'd understand us better
than perhaps even we ourselves do on the
other hand since the beginning of time
is a long time and so there's the chance
that whatever alien force had sent the
probe to us originally will have long
since died out ravaged by war or natural
disaster on their own planet or in their
own galaxy and leaving their furthest
flung tech to orbit other worlds like
ours as a relic if we were to rumble an
alien mission on earth then that might
be the safest outcome for us otherwise
we're sitting ducks hoping against hope
that our surveyors have mercy far enough
into the future is there any chance that
the tables could turn on this question
and humanity could be the one spying on
other civilizations
we do already have plans both state
funded and private to develop genuinely
interstellar probes bound for at least
the closest star system to us alpha
centauri but still most of all of our
searching for alien life at the moment
is done via tech that's either on earth
or much closer to us
we're still for the most part sending
out radio waves and then just hoping to
hear something back to do so ourselves
remains a dream for seti enthusiasts
everywhere then but in the meantime
that's how aliens may have been
monitoring us since the beginning of
time
what do you think is there anything we
missed let us know in the comments check
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