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The abduction phenomenon is an umbrella term used to describe hypotheses, claims, or assertions that non-human creatures (usually aliens) kidnap individuals — sometimes called "abductees" — usually for medical testing or for sexual reproduction procedures. Others are described as foretellers of doom who are trying to warn them of the declining state of their planet. Many such encounters are described as terrifying or humiliating, but others describe them as transformative or even pleasant. Reports of the abduction phenomenon have been made from around the world, but have perhaps seen most mainstream attention in the United States. Skeptics tend to doubt that the phenomenon occurs literally as reported, and a wide variety of alternate explanations have been proposed. Rather, such skeptics often argue that the phenomenon might be characterized as a type of modern-day folk myth (like the historic belief in vampires), or regard them as very vivid dreams in the state of sleep paralysis. The alien abduction phenomenon has been the subject of conspiracy theory and as such has become a staple of popular science fiction works such as The X-Files.
Few mainstream scientists believe the phenomenon literally occurs as reported, and most people contend the field is rife with kooks and pseudoscience. However, there is little doubt that many apparently stable persons who report alien abductions are sincere: as reported in the Harvard University Gazette in 1992, Dr. John Edward Mack investigated over 60 claimed abductees, and "spent countless therapeutic hours with these individuals only to find that what struck him was the 'ordinariness' of the population, including a restaurant owner, several secretaries, a prison guard, college students, a university administrator, and several homemakers ... 'The majority of abductees do not appear to be deluded, confabulating, lying, self-dramatizing, or suffering from a clear mental illness,' he maintained. He has encountered only one person who showed psychotic features." Other experts who have argued that abductees' mental health is no better or worse than average, including psychologists John Wilson and Rima Laibow, and psychotherapist David Gotlib.
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Some abduction reports are quite detailed. An entire subculture has developed around the subject, with support groups and a detailed mythos explaining the reasons for abductions: The various aliens (Greys, Reptilians, "Nordics" and so on) are said to have specific roles, origins, and motivations. Abduction claimants do not always attempt to explain the phenomenon, but some take independent research interest in it themselves, and explain the lack of greater awareness of alien abduction as the result of either extraterrestrial or governmental interest in cover-up.
Others are intrigued by the entire phenomenon, but hesitate in making any definitive conclusions. Emergency room physician Dr. John G. Miller asks, "How can a person have any firmly held belief about this when it's so mysterious? The opinions of the true believers are hard to swallow; and the opinions of the die-hard skeptics are not based on reality either. There is some middle ground ... It's clear that this is some sort of powerful subjective experience. But I do not know what the objective reality is. It's as if the evidence leads us in both directions." (Bryan, 162) Similarly, the late Harvard psychiatrist John Mack concluded, "The furthest you can go at this point is to say there's an authentic mystery here. And that is, I think, as far as anyone ought to go." (emphasis as in original) (Bryan, 269)
Putting aside the question of whether abduction reports are literally and objectively "real", literature professor Terry Matheson argues that their popularity and their intriguing appeal are easily understood. Tales of abduction "are intrinsically absorbing; it is hard to imagine a more vivid description of human powerlessness." After experiencing the frisson of delightful terror one may feel from reading ghost stories or watching horror movies, Matheson notes that people "can return to the safe world of their homes, secure in the knowledge that the phenomenon in question cannot follow. But as the abduction myth has stated almost from the outset, there is no avoiding alien abductors." (Matheson, 297)
Even hearing a tape recording of (or watching a video recording of) a hypnotic regression session can be a chilling experience, leaving little doubt to some observers that the individual is either an accomplished actor, or genuinely believes they are reliving a horrifying experience. Once hypnotized and supposedly recalling an abduction event, some people relate the event calmly, while others may beg pathetically for the event to stop, cry in apparent horror, shout angrily or tremble with fear. Matheson writes that when compared to the earlier contactee reports, abduction accounts are distinguished by their "relative sophistication and subtlety, which enabled them to enjoy an immediately more favorable reception from the public."
Life elsewhere?
It is probable that there is life elsewhere in the universe and that some of that life is intelligent. There is a high mathematical probability that among the trillions of stars in the billions of galaxies there are millions of planets in age and proximity to a star analogous to our Sun. The chances seem very good that on some of those planets life has evolved. It is even highly probable that natural selection governs that evolution (Dawkins). However, it is not inevitable that the results of that evolution would yield intelligence, much less intelligence equal or superior to ours. It is possible that we are unique (Pinker 1997: 150 ff.). We should not forget, however, that the closest star (besides our Sun) is so far away from Earth that travel between the two would take more than a human lifetime. The fact that it takes our Sun about 200 million years to revolve once around the Milky Way gives one a glimpse of the perspective we have to take of interstellar travel. We are 500 light-seconds from the sun. The next nearest star to Earth's sun (Alpha Centauri) is about 4 light-years away. That might sound close, but it is actually something like 24 trillion miles away. Even traveling at one million miles an hour, it would take more than 2,500 years to get there. To get there in twenty-five years would require traveling at more than 100 million miles an hour for the entire trip.* Our fastest spacecraft, Voyager, travels at about 40,000 miles an hour and would take 70,000 years to get to Alpha Centauri.
Despite the probability of life on other planets and the possibility that some of that life may be very intelligent, any signal from any planet in the universe broadcast in any direction is unlikely to be in the path of another inhabited planet. It would be folly to explore space for intelligent life without knowing exactly where to go. Yet, waiting for a signal might require a wait longer than any life on any planet might last. Finally, if we do get a signal, the waves carrying that signal left hundreds or thousands of years earlier and by the time we tracked its source down, the sending planet may no longer be habitable or even exist.
"...despite the fact that we humans are great collectors of souvenirs, not one of these persons [claiming to have been aboard a flying saucer] has brought back so much as an extraterrestrial tool or artifact, which could, once and for all, resolve the UFO mystery." Philip Klass
"Aliens, if an when we find them, could be so alien, so different from humanity as to undermine the meaning of any exchange we might have, or even make such exchange impossible." --Henry Gee
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