Professor: UFOs, Aliens are Human Anthropologists From Future
In a recent experiment, scientists reversed the arrow of time for a split second, simulating the possibility of time travel using quantum particles called qubits. The experiment was a far cry from achieving time travel anytime in the near future, but if it provides even a modicum of possibility it would support Dr. Michael P. Masters’ theory that UFOs and aliens might just be future anthropologists traveling back in time to study their ancestors — us.
Masters completed his Ph.D. in Anthropology at the Ohio State University and is currently a professor of biological anthropology at Montana Tech. His resume also cites coursework in astrobiology, astronomy, and physics – needless to say, he has some pretty relevant credentials.
Our Future Humanoid Alien Descendants
In his book Identified Flying Objects: A Multidisciplinary Scientific Approach to the UFO Phenomenon, Masters explores the evolution of humans in relation to our hominin ancestors, and our likely progression as a species moving forward. Based on the trajectory of our physical, intellectual, and technological development, he says he believes the common trope of the hairless, large-headed, technologically advanced alien is likely where evolution is leading us.
Humans have evolved to become (relatively) hairless creatures compared to our ancestors and many anthropologists believe we’ll eventually lose it entirely as it doesn’t really serve much of a function anymore, save aesthetics. Add to that the fact that our skull size has doubled and tripled to support a larger brain compared to the smaller cranium of ancestors like Homo erectus and Australopithecus, respectively.
“The phenomenon may be our own distant descendants coming back through time to study us in their own evolutionary past,” Masters told a local television station in his home state of Montana. “The extra-tempestrials are ubiquitously reported as being bipedal, upright-walking, five fingers on each hand and foot, bi-lateral symmetry, that they have two eyes, a mouth, a nose, and they can communicate with us in our own languages.”

Dr Michael P. Masters
If that’s the case, and close encounters with aliens are really close encounters with our future relatives, the term extraterrestrial wouldn’t be appropriate to describe our humanoid alien descendants. That’s why Masters coined the term, extratempestrials.
Much like the theme of Michael Crichton’s 1999 novel Timeline, Masters imagines how incredible it would be for future archeologists and anthropologists to travel back in time to study the eras and people we’ve only imagined from our history textbooks.
“As an anthropologist who has worked on and directed numerous archaeological digs in Africa, France, and throughout the United States, it is easy to conceptualize just how much more could be learned about our own evolutionary history, if we currently possessed the technology to visit past periods of time,” Masters said.
The Alien Anthropologist
Language is another facet of his argument: reported encounters with extraterrestrials often involve their ability to communicate with us through the same mechanisms we use for communication.
Masters posits the possibility that extraterrestrials from another planet with a different atmosphere, different physics, and different evolution might use different forms of vibratory communication – not necessarily through language.
Though admittedly just a theory, Masters had his book peer-reviewed by a number of his colleagues to verify some of the foundations of his conclusion.
The theory is an interesting one and might help explain or corroborate the theory that extraterrestrials sometimes appear to act as inter-dimensional entities, who are able to transcend time and space through apparently inexplicable means.
And as we consider some of the bizarre elements of UFO encounters and their seeming ability to zip in and out of existence, appearing to defy known laws of physics, one can’t help but think of Arthur C. Clarke’s famous line, “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”
UFO technology appears to be magic based on current technological capabilities, but much of our technology today would look like magic to anyone living a century ago, let alone hundreds, or thousands of years ago. What if we were to fast forward hundred or thousands of years from now?
Given that Moore’s Law — that is, computer processing power doubles every two years– has maintained, while quantum physics has conceptually made many science fiction themes now seem within the realm of possibility, time travel might just become science fact. That is, if our species is able to survive long enough to see it come to fruition, but if Masters’ theory is right, it appears we must have.
Scientist's Claim of UFO Fuel Source Verified Decades Later
Bob Lazar—perhaps no other name is as provocative in ufology as the man who introduced the world to the government’s most classified military facility, colloquially known as Area 51. Claiming to have once been employed at a secret test site in the Nevada desert, Lazar alleges he worked to reverse engineer one of nine alien spacecraft he says are hidden there.
The story begins in the 1980s, when Lazar was contracting as a physicist at Los Alamos National Labs in New Mexico — the infamous home of the Manhattan Project where the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were designed. Prior to his employment at Los Alamos, Lazar claims to have studied physics at MIT, and electronic technology at CalTech.
While at Los Alamos, Lazar recounts a process in which he was heavily vetted and specifically asked about his interests outside work, including the construction of a particle accelerator he built in his master bedroom. Soon, he said, he was tapped by military defense contractor EG&G to conduct highly-secretive work at a clandestine site within Area 51 known as S-4. Lazar says his superiors worked to get him what they called a “Majestic” clearance level in order to enter the facility.
In 1989, Lazar decided to blow the whistle and share his story on Las Vegas news station KLAS-TV, obfuscating his face and using the pseudonym “Dennis,” in an exposé with investigative reporter George Knapp. Eventually, he would shoot a follow-up with his face and true identity exposed, while also revealing that “Dennis” was the name of his alleged supervisor at S-4.
Since then, Lazar has been in some way related to countless attempts to either prove or debunk the conspiracy that the U.S. government (and/or a defense contractor) is in possession of highly advanced spacecraft not of this world, and that it has kept this knowledge hidden from the public for decades.