Condon UFO Report (The Scientific Study of UFOs), 1969
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In 1966, the U.S. Air Force commissioned what it intended to be the definitive study on the UFO phenomenon. The report, which concluded that there was no scientific value to UFO research, provided the Air Force with the justification to halt more than two decades of public investigative work, and solidified the current intellectual culture of UFO debunking. But a critical review of the report’s history shows that its scientific objectivity was compromised from the very beginning, and exposes the rigorous controversy behind Condon’s façade of scholarly consensus.
Background
By the mid 1960s, the U.S. Air Force had been studying UFOs for nearly twenty years, and the American public was frustrated with their apparent lack of progress. Ufologists like Physicist James E. McDonald and the Air Force’s own Scientific Consultant, J. Allen Hynek, as well as Congressman Gerald Ford, convinced the government to turn over the study of UFOs to the scientific community.
In 1966, U.S. Air Force settled a contract for a two-year, $500,000 study with the university of Colorado Boulder, to be directed by the preeminent Nuclear Physicist, Dr. Edward U. Condon. The study was completely unprecedented, and there was a lot of debate over the proper scope, methodology, and personnel. Both Hynek and McDonald offered to join the project, but they were rejected in favour of scientists with no public position on UFO research, and consequently, no significant exposure to the UFO data. Condon and Project Coordinator, Robert Low, considered this the only way of picking unbiased analysts.
While some of the team members took an active part in the research, Condon and Low showed little interest. Six months into the study, Condon announced that he thought UFO research was “nonsense,” and that the government shouldn’t be involved. He referred to those “damn UFOs” almost from the beginning. In discussing project strategy, Low wrote to university administrators that the “trick” would be to make the public think that the project was objective, while allowing scientists to recognize it as “a group of nonbelievers” with an “almost zero expectation of finding a saucer.” With this tip, he thought that the scientific community “would quickly get the message.”
Although support for the study was high when it was first announced, people grew skeptical of the team’s objectivity, particularly after Ufologist Donald Keyhoe leaked Low’s memo to the press. Low resigned in the ensuing controversy, staff members David Saunders and Norman Levine were fired, and NICAP, a major private UFO research group, withdrew their support. What remained of Condon’s team hired a number of outside specialists to help complete the report in 1969.
The Report
The authoritatively-named, “Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects,” led with Condon’s conclusions, in which he stated that nothing has come from UFO research that “has added to scientific knowledge,” and that further study “could not be justified in the expectation that science will be advanced thereby.” Condon also stated that the extraterrestrial hypothesis was the least likely explanation for UFOs, and that the airborne anomalies posed no threat to national security.
The report was well-received amongst mainstream scientists and science journalists, and an independent review requested by the Air Force from the National Academy of Sciences confirmed the project’s conclusions. Twelve of the fifteen project members disagreed with Condon’s summary, however, as did an independent report in 1970. Ufologists, including Hynek, McDonald, Saunders and Peter Sturrock of Stanford university, were unanimously critical, pointing out several crucial flaws.
First was the report’s light reliance on data and its arbitrary selection of cases. The report referred to less than 140 sightings in total, despite having access to some 25,000 case reports. Nearly half of Condon’s cases came from the year 1967, and very few had been identified as “genuine” or inexplicable, UFOs by previous study. Most were relatively weak and uninteresting cases, and mostly seem to have been selected for pragmatic reasons, and not for scientific ones.
Less than a quarter of the report’s 1400+ pages were devoted to reviewing case studies. Most chapters discussed related concepts, and were authored by non project members, often with little to no familiarity with the UFO data. Condon’s introduction hardly referred to the body of the report at all, and it never made mention of the fact that study analysts failed to explain nearly a third of the sightings in the data set. His conclusion that nothing of interest could come of UFO research seemed at odds with his analysts’ finding that current scientific knowledge could not account for a large portion of the data, and his focus on national security was criticized for being more in the interest of the Air Force than of science.
Aftermath
Despite these concerns, the Air Force accepted the report’s conclusions and closed Project Blue Book in 1970, terminating more than twenty years of research.
After the U.S. government’s withdrawal, American UFO research became dominated by independent groups with limited means and weak financial support. Hynek started his own group, CUFOS, where he served as scientific director. Other world governments maintain official UFO research groups, and a few scholars still publish on the topic, but most have trouble getting support from other scientists.
More so than any other document, the Condon Report is responsible for our default denial of the UFO evidence. It has frequently been cited as the definitive word on the UFO question, and it’s used as justification for denying funding to UFO research proposals. For these reasons, ufologists typically view the Condon Report not only as a failure of the scientific process, but as a major setback in the political struggle to integrate ufology into mainstream science.
Summary
What small portion of the Condon report is actually devoted to the UFO data tells us that a large minority of cases - around 30% - cannot be explained by scientific experts. This finding is in line with those of other major studies, such as Special Report 14, which found that 22.5% of cases defied conventional explanation. In other words, all it proves is that unidentified flying objects do exist. As Hynek noted, the report does nothing to explain what these objects are.
Beyond its immediate findings, however, the Condon Report demonstrates the danger in expecting definitive conclusions on the basis of a single study, especially on a topic as divisive as the UFO phenomenon. Condon’s botched report set ufology back by decades, and warns us of the unintended consequences of drawing government into the science of UFOs.
Sources:
David Saunders. "UFOs? Yes! Where the Condon Committee Went Wrong." New York: World Publishing Company, 1969.
Edward U. Condon. "Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects." New York: Colorado University Press, 1969.
Peter A. Sturrock. "An Analysis of the Condon Report on the Colorado UFO Project." J. Scientific Exploration, vol. 1, no. 1, 1987.
Support new videos on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=3375417
Think Anomalous is created by Jason Charbonneau. Illustration by Colin Campbell. Music by Josh Chamberland. Animation by Brendan Barr. Sound design by Will Mountain and Josh Chamberland.
UFO Case Review contains sound design with elements downloaded from Freesound.org. Typewriter_2rows.wav, Uploaded by Fatson under the Attribution License.
In 1966, the U.S. Air Force commissioned what it intended to be the definitive study on the UFO phenomenon. The report, which concluded that there was no scientific value to UFO research, provided the Air Force with the justification to halt more than two decades of public investigative work, and solidified the current intellectual culture of UFO debunking. But a critical review of the report’s history shows that its scientific objectivity was compromised from the very beginning, and exposes the rigorous controversy behind Condon’s façade of scholarly consensus.
Background
By the mid 1960s, the U.S. Air Force had been studying UFOs for nearly twenty years, and the American public was frustrated with their apparent lack of progress. Ufologists like Physicist James E. McDonald and the Air Force’s own Scientific Consultant, J. Allen Hynek, as well as Congressman Gerald Ford, convinced the government to turn over the study of UFOs to the scientific community.
In 1966, U.S. Air Force settled a contract for a two-year, $500,000 study with the university of Colorado Boulder, to be directed by the preeminent Nuclear Physicist, Dr. Edward U. Condon. The study was completely unprecedented, and there was a lot of debate over the proper scope, methodology, and personnel. Both Hynek and McDonald offered to join the project, but they were rejected in favour of scientists with no public position on UFO research, and consequently, no significant exposure to the UFO data. Condon and Project Coordinator, Robert Low, considered this the only way of picking unbiased analysts.
While some of the team members took an active part in the research, Condon and Low showed little interest. Six months into the study, Condon announced that he thought UFO research was “nonsense,” and that the government shouldn’t be involved. He referred to those “damn UFOs” almost from the beginning. In discussing project strategy, Low wrote to university administrators that the “trick” would be to make the public think that the project was objective, while allowing scientists to recognize it as “a group of nonbelievers” with an “almost zero expectation of finding a saucer.” With this tip, he thought that the scientific community “would quickly get the message.”
Although support for the study was high when it was first announced, people grew skeptical of the team’s objectivity, particularly after Ufologist Donald Keyhoe leaked Low’s memo to the press. Low resigned in the ensuing controversy, staff members David Saunders and Norman Levine were fired, and NICAP, a major private UFO research group, withdrew their support. What remained of Condon’s team hired a number of outside specialists to help complete the report in 1969.
The Report
The authoritatively-named, “Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects,” led with Condon’s conclusions, in which he stated that nothing has come from UFO research that “has added to scientific knowledge,” and that further study “could not be justified in the expectation that science will be advanced thereby.” Condon also stated that the extraterrestrial hypothesis was the least likely explanation for UFOs, and that the airborne anomalies posed no threat to national security.
The report was well-received amongst mainstream scientists and science journalists, and an independent review requested by the Air Force from the National Academy of Sciences confirmed the project’s conclusions. Twelve of the fifteen project members disagreed with Condon’s summary, however, as did an independent report in 1970. Ufologists, including Hynek, McDonald, Saunders and Peter Sturrock of Stanford university, were unanimously critical, pointing out several crucial flaws.
First was the report’s light reliance on data and its arbitrary selection of cases. The report referred to less than 140 sightings in total, despite having access to some 25,000 case reports. Nearly half of Condon’s cases came from the year 1967, and very few had been identified as “genuine” or inexplicable, UFOs by previous study. Most were relatively weak and uninteresting cases, and mostly seem to have been selected for pragmatic reasons, and not for scientific ones.
Less than a quarter of the report’s 1400+ pages were devoted to reviewing case studies. Most chapters discussed related concepts, and were authored by non project members, often with little to no familiarity with the UFO data. Condon’s introduction hardly referred to the body of the report at all, and it never made mention of the fact that study analysts failed to explain nearly a third of the sightings in the data set. His conclusion that nothing of interest could come of UFO research seemed at odds with his analysts’ finding that current scientific knowledge could not account for a large portion of the data, and his focus on national security was criticized for being more in the interest of the Air Force than of science.
Aftermath
Despite these concerns, the Air Force accepted the report’s conclusions and closed Project Blue Book in 1970, terminating more than twenty years of research.
After the U.S. government’s withdrawal, American UFO research became dominated by independent groups with limited means and weak financial support. Hynek started his own group, CUFOS, where he served as scientific director. Other world governments maintain official UFO research groups, and a few scholars still publish on the topic, but most have trouble getting support from other scientists.
More so than any other document, the Condon Report is responsible for our default denial of the UFO evidence. It has frequently been cited as the definitive word on the UFO question, and it’s used as justification for denying funding to UFO research proposals. For these reasons, ufologists typically view the Condon Report not only as a failure of the scientific process, but as a major setback in the political struggle to integrate ufology into mainstream science.
Summary
What small portion of the Condon report is actually devoted to the UFO data tells us that a large minority of cases - around 30% - cannot be explained by scientific experts. This finding is in line with those of other major studies, such as Special Report 14, which found that 22.5% of cases defied conventional explanation. In other words, all it proves is that unidentified flying objects do exist. As Hynek noted, the report does nothing to explain what these objects are.
Beyond its immediate findings, however, the Condon Report demonstrates the danger in expecting definitive conclusions on the basis of a single study, especially on a topic as divisive as the UFO phenomenon. Condon’s botched report set ufology back by decades, and warns us of the unintended consequences of drawing government into the science of UFOs.
Sources:
David Saunders. "UFOs? Yes! Where the Condon Committee Went Wrong." New York: World Publishing Company, 1969.
Edward U. Condon. "Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects." New York: Colorado University Press, 1969.
Peter A. Sturrock. "An Analysis of the Condon Report on the Colorado UFO Project." J. Scientific Exploration, vol. 1, no. 1, 1987.
Support new videos on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=3375417
Think Anomalous is created by Jason Charbonneau. Illustration by Colin Campbell. Music by Josh Chamberland. Animation by Brendan Barr. Sound design by Will Mountain and Josh Chamberland.
UFO Case Review contains sound design with elements downloaded from Freesound.org. Typewriter_2rows.wav, Uploaded by Fatson under the Attribution License.
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