Aliens have invaded the news again. Last month, two US presidents weighed in on the topic in rapid succession, managing to make a public that was already obsessed with extraterrestrials even more so.
First, Barack Obama sparked a furor by saying aliens are “real” during a podcast lightning round. He later clarified that he simply meant this in the sense that it’s very likely that there is life somewhere in the vast universe, but the accidental media frenzy seemed to inspire President Donald Trump to announce in a Truth Social post that his administration would “begin the process of identifying and releasing Government files related to alien and extraterrestrial life, unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), and unidentified flying objects (UFOs).”
The whole episode is yet more proof that aliens are a rare focus of fascination shared by people across myriad backgrounds.
“Whenever a high-ranking official—and you can't get much higher than a president and a former president—even touches on the subject in a passing comment,” it's “riveting,” says Greg Eghigian, a professor of history and bioethics at Penn State University who studies UAP and abduction stories.
It also raises the inevitable question: What is in those files?
A Defense Department official tells WIRED that the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), a branch of the Pentagon tasked with tracking UAP, is coordinating with the White House and federal agencies “to consolidate existing UAP records collections and facilitate the expeditious release of never-before-seen UAP information.”
“We welcome the president's initiative to supercharge these efforts and make more UAP information available to the public as soon as possible,” the official says.
While we won’t know what’s in the files until their release, it’s possible to speculate a bit about the likely content based on the many past government disclosures on the subject. But the bigger mystery may be whether any released material could ever satisfy the public’s insatiable curiosity about the possibility of discovering or contacting lifeforms from beyond Earth.
“This is a very fundamental existential question that we all have,” says Anamaria Berea, an associate professor at George Mason University who served on NASA's UAP Independent Study Team. “Is it just us, or are there some others out there? If they are out there, are they friendly or not? This is existential to our humanity. It's beyond science.”
What Do People Want to Be in the Files?
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