One theory which can no longer be taken very seriously is that UFOs are interstellar spaceships.
Interpretation
The idea that UFOs are spaceships from other planets is no longer credible.
In this quote, Arthur C. Clarke suggests that the theory of UFOs originating from distant planets lacks serious consideration among scientists. This reflects a broader skepticism towards claims that lack empirical evidence and urges a critical approach to understanding phenomena that captivate the imagination.
In practice
In a science class discussing the scientific method, this quote can highlight the importance of evidence in forming theories.
Nowhere in space will we rest our eyes upon the familiar shapes of trees and plants, or any of the animals that share our world. Whatsoever life we meet will be as strange and alien as the nightmare creatures of the ocean abyss, or of the insect empire whose horrors are normally hidden from us by their microscopic scale.
As our own species is in the process of proving, one cannot have superior science and inferior morals. The combination is unstable and self-destroying.
It has yet to be proven that intelligence has any survival value.
The best measure of a man's honesty isn't his income tax return. It's the zero adjust on his bathroom scale.
It was the mark of a barbarian to destroy something one could not understand.
My favorite definition of an intellectual: 'Someone who has been educated beyond his/her intelligence'.
[Science] is corrosive of religious belief, and it's a good thing too.
We already have the statistics for the future: the growth percentages of pollution, overpopulation, desertification. The future is already in place.
If you look at all the serious scientists in the world, there is no big disagreement on the basics of this...it would be absolute lunacy to act as if climate change is not occurring.
Chimps can do all sorts of things we thought that only we could do - like tool-making and abstraction and generalisation. They can learn a language - sign language - and they can use the signs. But when you think of our intellects, even the brightest chimp looks like a very small child.
The ascent of money has been essential to the ascent of man.
Of what use are the great number of petrifactions, of different species, shape and form which are dug up by naturalists? Perhaps the collection of such specimens is sheer vanity and inquisitiveness. I do not presume to say; but we find in our mountains the rarest animals, shells, mussels, and corals embalmed in stone, as it were, living specimens of which are now being sought in vain throughout Europe. These stones alone whisper in the midst of general silence.
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