I can't tell you whether or not aliens exist. But it seems unlikely to me that intelligent life should only exist on our one tiny planet, given the vastness of our universe.

It seems only natural, then, that humans would have speculated for centuries about the existence of aliens, about the idea that we are not alone.

It is possible that Area 51 has aliens, and that this is where our canonical image of aliens comes from (large eyes, small body, etc). However, I think it is also equally possible that someone just created a drawing or faked some photographs, and these images have simply been repeatedly copied in a similar form over time.

Currently the search for life outside our solar system seems to focus on finding "earth-like" planets.

1)foreigner: a person who comes from a foreign country; someone who does not owe allegiance to your country 2)transfer property or ownership; "The will aliened the property to the heirs" 3)stranger: anyone who does not belong in the environment in which they are found not contained in or deriving from the essential nature of something; "an economic theory alien to the spirit of capitalism"; "the mysticism so ... 4)estrange: arouse hostility or indifference in where there had formerly been love, affection, or friendliness; "She alienated her friends when she became fanatically religious" 5)extraterrestrial being: a form of life assumed to exist outside the Earth or its atmosphere 6)being or from or characteristic of another place or part of the world; "alien customs"; "exotic plants in a greenhouse"; "exotic cuisine"

The concept is an old one in which it refers to anything, person or place that is different or not from your environment. To which one are you refering?

I think the concept came from many people seeing creatures or beings that they could not identify and they happen to know they were not crazy the reason so many other people keep quiet for fear of being label crazy or on drugs.

You see if you see or hear something out of the norm of things people that have not seen or heard it tend to want to make you out to be crazy seeing it only in your head. But when two or more people see it together than that gives themselves some real value of being real.

There are so many thing on this earth that are fact but can not be proven as of yet. We do not know what is all up under the sea and oceans I am sure there are beings of some kind there as well for many hundreds and thousands of years.

UFO only means unidentified flying objects. So in reality we have an lot of unidentified objects that we have not discovered yet. But people are not talking as much about the flying ships are objects as they are about the unidentified beings they may or maynot have seen.

Now whether it goes back hundreds or thousands of years I don't know but probably. Whether they are real or not depends on who you are asking but there is an reason why so many people have claim to have seen them.

perhaps we are the descendants of the first colonist to colonize this planet and our ancestors have been looking for us ever since. Now that they have found us they are studing us to see how we devolved into a primitive then evolved into modern man with an instinct for survival and the will to kill our own to get what we want. We must seem so alien to them now.

I thought UFO meant: "Unidentified Flying Objects". Has it changed? Anyway, great topic. I also wondered where aliens come from. Or, if anyone has seen them.

Hi Rani, I may have an answer to your question here.

First of all, Alien is not a type of being it is a description of a being, the fully correct terminology would be "Beings alien to Earth." Just like UFOs that is another thing that people think as a thing, but it is not it is a description of a thing, it means Unidentifiable Flying Object, that means anything flying that is not identified is a UFO until it is identified as something. This could be a comet, an asteroid, a meteor, a bird, a plane, and helicopter, these are things that eventually get identified but as well something totally different that seems to be a space ship, maybe a time or dimension ship that will never be identified and will always remain a UFO no matter how much study is done on a photo.

These beings alien to Earth may be from space but may be from the future, in that case they are not alien at all but future earth beings or maybe different dimensional earth beings, we could still call them alien since they are alien to our environment anyway.

So the term Alien came long long before anyone ever though of being alien to earth, it started with people alien to our town, then country then eventually the idea lead to alien to the planet.

Where as the term UFO is probably as old as long as someone looked to the sky and said "what is that?", and was meant with "I don't know."

Added

A funny after thought just hit me, a lot like calling them "Space Aliens" but in fact if they came from space, they would be Space Natives or Earth Aliens.

Hi Rani i may the answear of your question.I think aliens are found realy not on earth but on other planets.As i read in book that water has been found in Mars.As God has created us and let us live on Earth.We do not have any proof that just Earth is full of creature.As few days before a strike of light has been seen in China.So according tomy point of view Aliens are real in our Galaxy.

If you read Old Testament and many other collections of ancient myths you will see many mentions of the "sons of heavens". They are usually stronger and smarter than the locals, they sleep with local women and produce children whose blood is then considered "royal", and they are discouraged from diluting it and encouraged to limit the breading to their nation only. Standard stuff in many myths. Would be silly to deny them -- the genes of aliens are most likely still in our DNA, even if barely noticeable now.

Concept: Humans may be very old. We may be generations old. Or we may be exactly two or three generations old with global destruction defining a "generation". They have had to suddenly evolve and drastically alter their physical manifestation in order to survive.

They now are very high tech or high energy. Perhaps because the previous world was very high energy. A meteor belt exists in our Solar system. It may be the remnants of a destroyed planet. If what ever wiped out that planet, destroyed a lot of life in our Solar system and this planet. Then perhaps "aliens" are creatures that are either from another time or stuck in time or on another energy level.

There is also plenty of talk about aliens being synthesized life forms.

Some old world life forms may be deteriorating and in need of another body. So perhaps this is what the synthesis is for.

Notes: All very interesting answers. I found this site while doing a google search. Since I know SO, I thought it was interesting. However, this site doesn't allow public(non-registered) contribution.

People with very creative imaginations and too much time on their hand.

I do believe there are other life forms somewhere in the infinite galaxies, just not like we have made them out to be.

IT iS AN ANOMALY THE ALIEN FACE CONSisTS of all human fears it is A SNAKE MOUTH BUG EYES AND A REPTILE NOSE OR SOMETHING F THAT SORT. IT ALL IN COMPOSTIOIN FRIGHTENS US INTO THE IDEA THAT A CREATURE COULD EXIST BECAUSE BY HUMAN NATURE WE ARE HARDWIRED TO FEAR THIS ILLUSION WE OURSELVES CREATED