I'd like to add that if I were an alien, I'd stay the fuck away from earth anyway, because we are a dumpster fire.

Totally possible and probable we "are not alone".
I've never understood how people can scoff at that.

One of my fav quotes:

“Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.”

― Arthur C. Clarke

Regarding intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, someone please alert me if any is found on earth.

g

Never saw an FUO. But the other day, I was laying back in a dentist's chair, with sun glasses on, under a very bright light. My lady dentist, and her assistant were doing strange things to my teeth; and she asked if I was okay. I told her I felt like I had been abducted by aliens, and was being examined aboard their space ship. They got a big laugh out of that. Did they do anything 'kinky' to me? Nope. But maybe next time!

Naturally I can't say that you didn't see what you say you saw. What I can say is that I've experienced the unreliability of my own mind and perceptions many times. It's actually rather sobering to realize that I can't entirely depend on them. So many times in more mundane situations I've jumped to conclusions that I discovered later were entirely wrong -- yet I was quite certain at the time. Is there any possibility that there is some other explanation for what you saw?

In general, I feel that if extraterrestrials were actually flying around Earth in various ships, there would be clear, incontrovertible evidence of it.

Having worked and been around airports most of my life, and the fact you were near a large city, it sounds like you’re describing an aircraft ascending. Over long periods of time our memories are terrible. The odds are for life somewhere out in the universe. If that life has the intelligence/technology to travel the distance required, I would think it would just observe us undetected. Much as a human would not go striding into a troop of gorillas.

A the beginning of my religious research journey, I did a lot of extraterrestrial research. THere are books about aliens in the bible, especially Ezekiel. After a while I realized that most of it was bad arguments and insubstantial.
My view is that the universe is vast, and I doubt that life is that uncommon. I also think we are living on a remote island and it seems to be that we are alone. Have we been visited? are we a ancient genetic experiment abandoned? Are we a quirk of evolution?
My Mom tells of a UFO she witnessed before I was born. Ive been an airline pilot for over 30 years. and I havent seen one yet..SMH.

To quote Carl Sagan “The universe is a pretty big place. If it's just us, seems like an awful waste of space.”

I am not saying the life is intelligent or even halfway there, it could be bacterial, plant, microscopic still, or it could be so far past our understanding that we look like simpletons to it. If animal (as we understand it) it would I believe still consist of a tube with support systems attached (essentially we are a tube mouth to anus that has arms and legs a fish is a tube with fins) but it may not it may absorb through its skin anything is possible which makes it wondrous.

As to what you saw, who am I to say I have never seen anything like that. If you decide to start a cult based on the experience I will call you out on it but I can not suggest anything for what you describe.

we are an alien childs experiment left on the shelf after the grade was given

That kind of UFO talk always reminds me about the Prime Directive in Star Trek.
If some aliens can make it all the way to here and they don't want to be seen, I don't think it's much possible for a humble bunch of apes with car keys like us to be actually able to see them.

I have seen unidentified flying objects. That doesn't mean that there wasn't a reasonable explanation for them.

I live on a flat plain where nothing except a few trees blocks my view of the sky. I look up often, but have never seen a UFO. I know people who swear they have, and I believe they believe they did. I would never say definitively that they don't exist, but I'm not convinced that they do. Any species advanced enough to get here would look at us as we do monkeys. We would interest them only as food or vermin in need of extermination, so they could claim the planet. On the up side, we are rapidly making our planet look like a less attractive option for alien life forms.

Those who believe that aliens have visited Earth are using the “god of the gaps” argument. If something is unexplained, it doesn’t mean there are aliens, any more than there is a god. 5000 gods, and zero evidence of any of them. Umpteen thousand UFO sightings, and again zero evidence. What a coincidence.

I helped form a skeptics organisation in Canada in the 80s. I handled most of the UFO claims. UFOs are possible, but let's look at the reality of the situation. It is not like UFOs can fly here for a weekend adventure. The amount of energy required to transport between stars in enormous. If another civilisation visits us, it is not going to be to scare cows in a back water hick town. They are going to be visible from before they enter the solar system. Sure there is the possibility that they will have worm holes or some other esoteric form of travel. But, we have seen no compelling evidence of even one UFO.
Someone came up to me after a meeting many years ago, and recounted their personal experience and said "Explain that!". So I did. They were furious. The most likely explanation, I said, is that you are lying. Next most likely is that your memory is faulty (read Elizabeth Loftus work on memory). The next most likely is that you were fooled by something (jets adjusting their landing lights can cause what looks like UFOs to race across the sky) you saw. Way, way down the list is it likely that you actually saw a extra-terrestial vehicle.

The Drake equation.

N=R x fp x ne x fl x fi x fc x L

where:

N = the number of civilizations in our galaxy with which communication might be possible

and

R = the average rate of star formation in our galaxy
fp = the fraction of those stars that have planets
ne = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets
fl = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point
fi = the fraction of planets with life that actually go on to develop intelligent life (civilizations)
fc = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space
L = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space.

[en.wikipedia.org]

The main reason aliens have not shown themselves is because we are so stupid we would try to harm them thinking they were here to take us over. They have the ability to see all our TV shows and get a view of just how dangerous we actually are. They do not want to have to defend themselves so they hide if they are here at all. If you were smart and in the same circumstance you would do the same thing. If they are visiting us then we know they are not after any of our resources as they would not want to have to sort all the garbage from what they want. That is unless they wanted a beer, a good glass of wine, or something else for entertainment. Everything else exists out in the asteroid belt. Out there one would not have to put up with us and our stupidity.

In a universe this big, the idea that we are the only life is pretty amazingly arrogant. But the idea that said life would spend the time and energy to travel all the way here to see us? Equally arrogant. Possible? Sure. Probable? . . . .

We jump to the most complex/fun options first. The still high tech looking SR-71 Blackbird jet was first come up with in the 50's - and flew for more than 20 years before any public got a peek at it. So, what might be flying now that we won't see for 20 years? There must be new technology, and it must be pretty wild at this point!

"Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?" -- Douglas Adams

Extraterrestrial life must exist, but I have serious, serious doubts about any of them visiting Earth. The sheer distance alone is a huge problem.

You saw a "UFO," though: an unidentified flying object. That does not mean that it was extraterrestrial in origin. It just means that you saw something that you could not identify. Occam's Razor: the simplest explanation is usually the correct explanation. There are other, more logical and reasonable explanations--even if you are not cognizant of them.

The biggest question for me is if aliens have visited us, why do they not just announce themselves? Are they following the "prime directive"? If so, being so sloppy in allowing us to see them has already violated the directive.

I have been looking up (amateur astronomer) for over 65 years. I only twice have seen something that I could not identify. Once was a very high object moving slowly above the mountains of Virginia, probably a very high flying aircraft. The other was about 7 years ago here in Az. 4 lights in a check mark pattern bright, moving towards me. Seen for about 10 minutes. We stopped the car, it was abt. 10 at night. Absolutely no noise or sound. They held formation and moved off to my right. They were in front of some mountains that were about 6 miles away. Gradually disappeared. Moved like helicopters. Do we have stealth 'copters? It was really eerie. And, yes I'd love to believe they were aliens but probably military, ours I hope.

I've never experienced one but believe 100% that they are out there. United States Army Colonel Philip J. Corso wrote a book called 'The Day After Roswell' which is a fascinating read from a first (military) person account.

Hey, you better watch out or Meepzor will probe yo ass!

Believing in something without hard evidence kinda sounds like religion? Maybe you really didn't see what you think - like all the people that swear they saw a statue crying tears of blood...?

Better question...why is it mostly people who live in either suburbs or bumfuck farm country who complain of shit like getting abducted? It's almost as if it's the farther people are from each other, the more likely they'll more readily believe anything!

I do believe in the literal meaning of UFOs (Unidentified Flying Objects). They key is that they are unidentified. Could be futuristic military machines. Based on how much the USA spends on its military, I would suspect they have all kinds of UFOs sitting in hangers somewhere. I have to suspect that there is other life somewhere other than earth. Earth is not the center of the universe unlike what the Bible suggests based on the fact that all if the stories take place in a small area of one planet. If we ever discover higher life forms on other planets it will be an incredible discovery especially when scientists have a comparable to study evolution and species development based on entirely different environmental variables.