by Timothy Blankenhorn

Created on: December 16, 2008   Last Updated: January 20, 2009

Sgt. Clifford Stone, retired from the US Army, stated in 2001 that 57 different species of space aliens, ET's , have been catalogued by secret operations in the Army. He knows this, he says, because he was one of those secret guys for 22 years. There are species called "greys" and "blues", numerous forms of "humanoids" that look a lot like us, and there are aliens that look a lot like lizards.

Sgt. Stone and the Disclosure Project (http://www.disclosureproject.org/) say they are speaking out and disobeying their oath to government secrecy because they think it is unhealthy to keep such information from the public. They think it is time to come clean.

Hmm. What are we to make of such claims?

The key, I think, is to remember that we don't have to sign on either with the hard-nosed skeptics - or with the true believers. There is plenty of middle ground... to "wait and see."

Below I list the facts I cling to. Maybe they will be helpful to you:

1.) Neither I, nor anyone I know, nor anyone directly known to me, has ever laid eyes on such a spaceman. As far as I know.

2.) If I saw a UFO, I am not sure that I would tell anyone. To do so would be to take an amazing risk... with your boss, for example, or your father-in-law.

3.) A lot of normal-seeming people have described encounters with aliens. They don't seem delusional to me. In fact, they seem fairly ordinary, even dull people. It's not clear to me what would motivate individuals in a category like this to make up something so strange.

4.) There is remarkable consistency to the reports. If they were random in their form, or if they were identical, then I would have my guard up.

5.) How can anyone prove a negative? How can we be sure that there are no aliens out thereout there in the big world?

6.) The chances of alien life existing out there somewhere, flying saucers or not, are pretty strong. A college professor of mine argued that there are as many planets in the universe as grains of sand on earth.

7.) We would find it very inconvenient to believe in UFO's and ET's. We would have to seriously re-adjust lots and lots of thoughts layered in our brain. (It hurts to even think about!)

8) Why is there no proof? Why is it that Katie Couric or Tom Lehrer can't stand in front of us and confirm UFO activity? Especially now that there are a gazillion phone cameras out in the world.

and

9) How could the government possibly keep a secret for so long?

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