Anybody think there are Aliens (UFO)?

[Rramjet]

You do seriously need to improve your reading comprehension skills, Rramjet. That's not what StevenCalder was saying at all. Try again.

Merely proffering a sweeping generalisation based on unfounded (and unstated) assumptions makes such a statement neither sensible nor true. A typical “debunker” trick – ignore the substantive point of the argument (possibly because you have missed it? Or because you don’t understand it? Or because you have no counter argument?) – and instead to attack the messenger with unfounded assertion.

So we can have…

And again you've completely misunderstood what I said. You can probably take a remedial reading course at your high school after school hours or in the evening. Ask your principal or counselor about it.

…without so much as even a slightest indication of how or why such “conclusion” was drawn (and of course I will refrain from making a jibe about grade-school spelling levels).


But then we come to what initially might seem to be a substantive point…

And why is it so difficult to name the number of events where a flying object was initially unidentified, and later determined to be a craft from another planet? Do you know the answer, Rramjet?

…and the price of fish is? What’s your point GeeMack? As you have so graciously pointed out, my reading comprehension skills “seriously need improving” – so obviously you will have to explain your point to me. Walk me through the logic of it.

 

[devnull]

Rramjet: its easy!

Are there UFOs? Yes! Noone would deny that many things seen in the sky are unidentified.

Are they alien in origin? There is no evidence to believe so. Your UFO website is full of wishful thinking and the same old debunked mis-identifications we've all seen before. You have presented nothing of any real value.

So if you are arguing that UFOs exist, we agree!

 

[StevenCalder]

Which of course suddenly reverts to the – “All the crows I have seen are black, therefore all crows are black” logical fallacy – despite all previous statements claiming innocence of committing such a fallacy - and of course again, such a statement completely IGNORES the evidence!

Wow your really didn't understand what I was saying at all. At this stage I'm not sure if its an intentional bias against any position but your own, meaning you don't actually read the content and just assume a position and fill in the gaps with a brief skim of other peoples posts or just unintentional lack of reading comprehension.

Either way, I'm not reiterating myself to someone who will not read what I'm saying or infer other meaning to it anyway.

Good luck finding confirming evidence of the alien origin of UFO's, lets us know when you do.

 

[StevenCalder]

Merely proffering a sweeping generalisation based on unfounded (and unstated) assumptions makes such a statement neither sensible nor true. A typical “debunker” trick – ignore the substantive point of the argument (possibly because you have missed it? Or because you don’t understand it? Or because you have no counter argument?) – and instead to attack the messenger with unfounded assertion.

So I take it you think the fact that Alien visitation over a millennia has yet to result in confirming evidence of alien visitation is a sweeping generalisation based on unfounded (and unstated) assumptions?

That's entirely what I was referring to.

 

[SnidelyW]

I'd like to ask the rather spirited opponents of Rramjet to kindly present for everyone what their standards are for photgraphic evidence of a UFO.

Short of a figurative 'smoking gun', are you all dismissing photo evidence as totally unreliable?

What specific provenance would meet this seemingly arbitrary standard you appear to have?

I am not referring to 'aliens', but simply photo (or video) evidence of UFO's?

It's fine to discuss the merits of logical fallacies, but I'm just attempting to understand where the 'gold standard' for photo evidence may lay.

 

[StevenCalder]

I'd like to ask the rather spirited opponents of Rramjet to kindly present for everyone what their standards are for photgraphic evidence of a UFO.

Short of a figurative 'smoking gun', are you all dismissing photo evidence as totally unreliable?

What specific provenance would meet this seemingly arbitrary standard you appear to have?

I am not referring to 'aliens', but simply photo (or video) evidence of UFO's?

It's fine to discuss the merits of logical fallacies, but I'm just attempting to understand where the 'gold standard' for photo evidence may lay.

I'm sorry but this isn't the crux of the discussion with Rramjet (we are discussing the logical assumption of likely hood of confirming evidence appearing based on current evidence not what is required for future evidence) and your question has already been discussed in the thread, responding to you.

ETA: Whoops, my apologies, Missed that you were asking what level evidence was required to prove something as unidentified. As Stray Cat says below - evidence is unrequired to be unidentified, obviously its unidentified until its proven to be something.

 

[Stray Cat]

I'd like to ask the rather spirited opponents of Rramjet to kindly present for everyone what their standards are for photgraphic evidence of a UFO.
Short of a figurative 'smoking gun', are you all dismissing photo evidence as totally unreliable?
What specific provenance would meet this seemingly arbitrary standard you appear to have?
I am not referring to 'aliens', but simply photo (or video) evidence of UFO's?
It's fine to discuss the merits of logical fallacies, but I'm just attempting to understand where the 'gold standard' for photo evidence may lay.

A photo isn't inherently 'unreliable'... but their long history of unreliableness (in relation to exotic alien spacecraft) does point towards that being the case. However, this is mere speculation.

The point being that we DON'T need photographic 'smoking guns' to prove UNIDENTIFIED fly objects as it is clear from records that some flying objects remain unidentified.

 

[SnidelyW]

The reason for the enquiry regarding the 'gold standard' for photo evidence is that there exist many hundreds of photos which show UFO's.

I am only asking you to quantify your heretofore apparent nebulous standards for acceptance of photo evidence as such.

Anyone can look at a photo and say things like 'pie plate', or 'garbage can lid' etc.

I can look at a photo and say "oh yes, I think that is definitely some sort of flying object under its own propulsion".

What standards are you going to use to prove me wrong, other than a casual scoff?

 

[SnidelyW]

Stray Cat- I would posit the opposite- that normal folks who happen to be in the right place have captured extraordinary objects in the sky, often by accident, and have not taken any action regarding them other than to post them to a place where they believe they can have their questions answered. They have neither the technical ability nor the inclination to fabricate a hoax, and, often wish their name be withheld for fear of ridicule.

When one sees something strange in a photo, one seeks an explanation.

 

[fuelair]

Does anybody on this site think/believe/know if there have been ETs that have visited Earth? If not, do you think that all of the reports/photos, etc. have plausible explanations, even the ones that can't be explained due to a lack of data?

To be fair, I will go on record as saying that I think there is a more probable than not possibility that there were or are.

Aliens, almost certainly. Been here, almost certainly not (Asimov and others did the calculations - chances remarkably small that any have/will).

 

[riptowtan]

It seems most UFO enthusiasts conclude that all unknown objects= aliens. Even if the UFO is a craft doesn't mean its alien. It could be a top secret military project. The evidence you are providing simply says that they do not know what the witnesses saw, and since military officials worked on Project Blue Book, surely they would classify their own secret planes as UFOs.

 

[RoboTimbo]

The reason for the enquiry regarding the 'gold standard' for photo evidence is that there exist many hundreds of photos which show UFO's.

I am only asking you to quantify your heretofore apparent nebulous standards for acceptance of photo evidence as such.

Anyone can look at a photo and say things like 'pie plate', or 'garbage can lid' etc.

I can look at a photo and say "oh yes, I think that is definitely some sort of flying object under its own propulsion".

What standards are you going to use to prove me wrong, other than a casual scoff?

Pie plate. Prove me wrong.

 

[SnidelyW]

The 'Pie plate. Prove me wrong.' strikes the wrong chord with me because of my own inherent curiosity to explore, test, and truly understand those things which are not immediately known.

Simply saying an image of a UFO is a pie plate seems to be telling the world that all one has to do to be a skeptic is to admit that anything unusual is immediately explainable by declaring it a fraud, or something already known.

Imagine the history of mankind had everyone, upon being exposed to something never before seen, dismissed it as a fraud or something mundane, and went back to their sheep.

What is the downside of saying- "Wow, that photo shows us something never before seen?"

 

[Marduk]

What is the downside of saying- "Wow, that photo shows us something never before seen?"

Ufology
Cereology
Pseudo history
Pseudo Archaeology
Woo
Quackery
Religion
Homeopathy
etc

perhaps rather than making a judgement that its never been seen before it would help to find out what it is first.

 

[Clownshoes]

I think there is defiantly another intelligent life form in the universe. The odds are mind boggling to think that we are all alone.

Did or do they visit earth?.....No, the distances are just to much

 

[Nonpareil]

I think there is defiantly another intelligent life form in the universe. The odds are mind boggling to think that we are all alone.

Did or do they visit earth?.....No, the distances are just to much

^-This-^

 

[StevenCalder]

...because of my own inherent curiosity to explore, test, and truly understand those things which are not immediately known.

...

What is the downside of saying- "Wow, that photo shows us something never before seen?"

See here is a bit of the problem snidely, the first section is great and something I applaud. The second section pretty much abandons the first just to be able to say "Wow that's something never seen before". You don't actually truly understand anything about the object (that's what it means to be unidentified) but instead of just sticking there at the limits of your knowledge you throw a great big "This is something new" sticker on the side. It is a very attractive prospect to jump head first in without any hard evidence. But your using 'I don't know' to justify 'I know its something new'.

Unidentified doesn't necessarily mean its something new. Most of the time its just because there's not enough data to make a definitive conclusion, new explanations may be the cause, but we need to show that they are before we can say they are with intelectual honesty.

And don't worry about evidence being misclassified if aliens are really visiting us I'm sure we will get some stronger evidence than slightly dodgy looking photos of objects that look nothing like each other. Its not like we only get 1 shot at it, they have apparently been here every other day, on our corn fields and such.

As has been said before, as soon as you prove something as something new be it aliens, faeries, spectral orbs or anything specific this whole conversation changes dramatically.

 

[RoboTimbo]

The 'Pie plate. Prove me wrong.' strikes the wrong chord with me because of my own inherent curiosity to explore, test, and truly understand those things which are not immediately known.

Simply saying an image of a UFO is a pie plate seems to be telling the world that all one has to do to be a skeptic is to admit that anything unusual is immediately explainable by declaring it a fraud, or something already known.

Imagine the history of mankind had everyone, upon being exposed to something never before seen, dismissed it as a fraud or something mundane, and went back to their sheep.

What is the downside of saying- "Wow, that photo shows us something never before seen?"

So you totally missed the point. You need to read up on 'burden of proof'. Your contention was that you were fine saying that it was something extraordinary and sceptics would be unable to 'prove you wrong'. I posit that it is something mundane and for you to 'prove me wrong'.

What is the downside of saying- "Wow, that photo shows us something that I can't immediatly identify and therefore it is unknown."

 

[StevenCalder]

Your contention was that you were fine saying that it was something extraordinary and sceptics would be unable to 'prove you wrong'. I posit that it is something mundane and for you to 'prove me wrong'.

Oh yes I forgot to mention that if you want to posit something beyond normal accepted knowledge your the one who has to supply the evidence Snidely, not the other way around.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

 

[GeeMack]

You do seriously need to improve your reading comprehension skills, Rramjet. That's not what StevenCalder was saying at all. Try again.

Merely proffering a sweeping generalisation based on unfounded (and unstated) assumptions makes such a statement neither sensible nor true. A typical "debunker" trick -- ignore the substantive point of the argument (possibly because you have missed it? Or because you don’t understand it? Or because you have no counter argument?) -- and instead to attack the messenger with unfounded assertion.

No trick here, no generalization, and not unfounded. Since your replies are often only vaguely related to the comments you seem to be replying to, it appears you're misunderstanding much of what you're reading in this thread. It is possible that you misrepresented StevenCalder's comment intentionally, but that would be dishonest. I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt by suggesting you have a reading comprehension problem. I suppose it could be that you're just a liar.

So we can have...

And again you've completely misunderstood what I said. You can probably take a remedial reading course at your high school after school hours or in the evening. Ask your principal or counselor about it.

...without so much as even a slightest indication of how or why such "conclusion" was drawn (and of course I will refrain from making a jibe about grade-school spelling levels).

The conclusion about your reading skills was drawn, as mentioned above, by the fact that you seem to regularly misunderstand what other people write. But again, I'm willing to allow that your reading skills are fine and that the problem is with your ability to be honest. (Oh, and most of the words I've used in these posts I did learn to spell in grade school.)

But then we come to what initially might seem to be a substantive point...

And why is it so difficult to name the number of events where a flying object was initially unidentified, and later determined to be a craft from another planet? Do you know the answer, Rramjet?

...and the price of fish is? What’s your point GeeMack? As you have so graciously pointed out, my reading comprehension skills "seriously need improving" -- so obviously you will have to explain your point to me. Walk me through the logic of it.

My point? For your benefit, since reading is apparently difficult for you (or are you a liar?), this thing here --> "?" is a question mark. When someone uses one at the end of a sentence, it means they're asking a question, seeking a reply to a matter of concern or curiosity. My question to jakesteele was...

So, jakesteele, in real numbers, how many of those previously unidentified sky sightings, after they were identified, turned out to be alien space craft? Real numbers, now, not some evasive vague reply belittling skeptics for wrecking your fantasy. Have there been 43 alien space craft identified? 12? 236? Just exactly how many?

And I more or less reiterated the question to you, Rramjet...

And why is it so difficult to name the number of events where a flying object was initially unidentified, and later determined to be a craft from another planet? Do you know the answer, Rramjet?

See that little "?" at the end? That means I'm looking for you or jakesteele to answer with a number, if you know how many, or with an, "I don't know," if you don't. If I have a point to be built from your reply to that, I can hardly pursue it as long as you and jakesteele remain evasive.