When science encounters the unexplained it tends only to see reflected back those concepts that self-validate the assumptions by (and through) which this well-ordered system of knowledge persists. The absence of unambiguous evidence is also the kind of thing we might expect when encountering any intelligence that is seeking for whatever reasons to obscure its presence.
Why, then, might these visitors experience technological malfunctions and other problems that raise the masked veil upon their presence? This is quite simply because they are as subject to the statistical uncertainties of physics as we are. They may, indeed, define physics (and reality) in unexpected ways but they are as obligated to its logic as are we.
If anything, the notion that a super-intelligent hyper-technology is prone to mechanical and/or user error should reassure us as to the presence of binding physical and logical principles in nature. Entropy is irreducible and this, in my opinion, forms as solid a foundation to build upon as we might ever assert.
As for the physicist interviewed – his dismissals are jovially accurate but suffer from the common-enough self-congratulatory hubris that another person’s experience is subordinate to his own system of belief. It is the “it was just a weather balloon” trope, wearing a new mask.
Daedelus Kite 