Research Blog #9 - Argument & Counterargument

 My Argument:

In my paper, I explained that scientists like astrobiologists, ufologists, and astronomers of many different generations have tried their best to understand and learn about space and get a possible answer to the question: are we alone in the universe? Many conspiracy theorists have tried to use their observations and opinions to come up with different explanations as to whether or not aliens exist. But over decades, since the U.S. government started to search for extraterrestrial intelligence, the research and project did not have much progress, due to the boundary work between SETI scientists and ufologists and other external effects. The boundaries that hinder these scientists from collaborating with each other, limit the many possible discoveries on the outer space. 


A counter-argument of ufology being considered a pseudoscience is :

Ufologists are not just ordinary people who are digging information and analyzing their findings to understand things that they don't even know about. "In 1976 a survey was conducted among donors to the Center for UFO Studies in Evanston, Illinois. One-fifth of the 161 donors who answered the survey had Ph.D. degrees and a total of 75 percent has earned at least a bachelor's degree. The most common degrees were in physics engineering, but others covered the entire spectrum of academia -- there were even three with MLS degree." This quote is enough to explain that Ufologists is not just an ordinary person without a proper college degree who is interested in working on conspiracy theories. They are well-educated professionals that have learned enough data and information to consider themselves reliable researchers. 


Eberhart, G. M. (1980). UFO Literature for the Serious Ufologist. RQ, 144-148.


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