Anybody think there are Aliens (UFO)?

[Stray Cat]

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?

But you limited your criteria to Just the photos!
So I look at them, compare them to what I KNOW and make a judgement based on that. The 'What I know' bit has come from studying UFOology for nearly 20 years. But according to your post, we should just look at the photos and so it seemed pointless me going into a long response about the wider UFO phenomenon, the motives of people, the misidentifications made by people (credible and un-credible) etc.

 

[fuelair]

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

Asimov's specific point (as well as other's).

 

[fuelair]

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?"

Short and boring point here. Saying it is something from earth/trick photograph does not require major evidence because both have been shown to happen innumerable times. So far, nothing in a photo has been shown to be an alien created flying vehicle.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. A photo - especially of the quality of most UFO claim photos I have seen - gets nowhere near extraordinary.

 

[Stray Cat]

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.

But the fact that they turn to the dubious UFOlogy sites to present their 'extraordinary objects' shows a lack of real critical thinking and leans towards a bias towards a desire to confirm the exotic. In most cases, a critical analysis (I mean real critical, not once through the UFOlogy filter) shows the objects to be something quite easily explained.

Now don't let that make you think that the explanations are 100% confirmed to be mundane, but in the grand scheme of things, the mundane is the most likely, with the exotic natural phenomena being second and alien space craft being least likely. For the photos that can not be identified (usually due to lack of information contained in the photo), we have a category of 'Unidentified'... which doesn't mean Alien Craft or 'Something new and Exciting', it means we don't know...

Of course as has already been said countless times on this thread, if just ONE photo/video/report was to confirm that alien craft were constantly visiting our planet it would drastically alter the chances of 'some' of the historical accounts being alien craft... but at this time, there is no evidence to support this as being likely and tons of evidence to show it is not.

 

[SnidelyW]

I agree you have struck at the heart of the UFO reporting phenomena, regarding the bias towards the incontrivertible proof grail. I think everyone would admit that they want to be the person with the positive 'proof', so bias is inherent.

When one hears hoofbeats, we usually do not look for a zebra.

However, I deliberately limited the emphasis to just the photos, as those remain constant vis-a vis memories of an event.

The issue I have with your 'what you know' statement is that you are admitting we know nothing regarding UFO's but you compare UFO's to 'what you know'.

Where is the valid comparison? The pie plate? To look at an image and say 'pie plate' does such a disservice to critical thinking, regardless of the result. In fact, I think the argument that a true critical thinker is less likely to make such a dismissive statement. Am I missing something in your argument?

So, say you take a photo of a person, and a UFO shows up in the photo, but you saw nothing during the taking of the photo itself. How are you going to convince the world this photo is genuine?

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

Just to address Roger's search for a white crow:

It's not good enough to say, "I've seen one." The saucerian world is full of people seeing "white crows". To date where "white crow" sightings have been followed up (because there is enough physical evidence of the "bird") they proved to be pigeons and seagulls. Bring the "black crow" to an ornithologist and have him examine its teeth* and try to wash the white paint off. If he says its a white crow, then I will agree that such exists.

___________________
* It's a joke son. A joke.

 

[Stray Cat]

The issue I have with your 'what you know' statement is that you are admitting we know nothing regarding UFO's but you compare UFO's to 'what you know'.

What we know is merely a starting point. First we have to compare it to what we know... if we can not compare it to what we know, it can be labeled as unknown. I know what two mixing bowls glued together look like.

Where is the valid comparison?

The pie plate? To look at an image and say 'pie plate' does such a disservice to critical thinking, regardless of the result. In fact, I think the argument that a true critical thinker is less likely to make such a dismissive statement. Am I missing something in your argument?

Yes, you are missing the point that I was making in my dismissal.
You were essentially asking what people thought was in the photos.
Using only the photos as reference, such a narrowly defined investigation is going to produce narrowly defined conclusions.
Of course I can elaborate greatly on my dismissal if you want and show exactly HOW I reached the conclusions I did, but it would expand the investigation beyond the parameters you set.

So, say you take a photo of a person, and a UFO shows up in the photo, but you saw nothing during the taking of the photo itself. How are you going to convince the world this photo is genuine?

I doubt anyone would argue that the photo wasn't 'genuine'.
The contentious point would be exactly what the object on the photo was.
If someone were claiming it was an alien craft, the short answer is it wouldn't satisfy anyone except those who already had an investment in blind faith of the existence of alien craft visiting our planet. The rest would be down to the amount of detail that could be analysed in the photo and corroborating witness statements to try to see if it was something already known, or something that would have to classify as unknown.

Do you have an example of such a photo, perhaps we could discuss it?

 

[StevenCalder]

I agree you have struck at the heart of the UFO reporting phenomena, regarding the bias towards the incontrivertible proof grail. I think everyone would admit that they want to be the person with the positive 'proof', so bias is inherent.

I'm not sure what you mean by "bias" here - incontrivertible proof allows us to know for certain that the first hand witnesses of aliens did in fact witness aliens and not some other yet to be determined cause.

So yes I guess in that sense, there is a bias towards knowing whether or not aliens are the cause for some UFO's.

However, I deliberately limited the emphasis to just the photos, as those remain constant vis-a vis memories of an event.

Would you like me to photoshop myself into one of the photos from earlier in the thread?

So, say you take a photo of a person, and a UFO shows up in the photo, but you saw nothing during the taking of the photo itself. How are you going to convince the world this photo is genuine?

One single photo alone of an object in the sky cannot be used as incontrivertible proof that the object is of alien origin due to the already detailed problems of the medium.

What if it was just something and we don't really know what it was?
We can't jump from there to aliens.

No one is arguing that there aren't unidentified things in the skies.

What might make a photo more compelling has been brought up earlier in the thread. But one photo alone wont work as incontrovertible evidence.

 

[EHocking]

Just to address Roger's search for a white crow:

It's not good enough to say, "I've seen one." The saucerian world is full of people seeing "white crows". To date where "white crow" sightings have been followed up (because there is enough physical evidence of the "bird") they proved to be pigeons and seagulls. Bring the "black crow" to an ornithologist and have him examine its teeth* and try to wash the white paint off. If he says its a white crow, then I will agree that such exists.

___________________
* It's a joke son. A joke.

And to prove the point, here are some white crows.

They are albino, of course.

But there do exist non-abarrent crows that are not all black; Pied Crows, Grey Crows and Brown-headed Crows.

Now all the UFO proponents need do, is produce the same level of evidence to prove conclusively the existence of the UFO "white crow" - ET craft.

 

[Stray Cat]

But there do exist non-abarrent crows that are not all black; Pied Crows,...

Maybe they fly around in craft made by gluing two metal pie dishes together?

 

[EHocking]

You're Raven mad if you believe something like that...

 

[leafman91]

he doesnt need one, I already answered it, your previous post contained no evidence that could be taken as a tacit admission that ufos or aliens were a reality, unless you are reading it with that preconceived conclusion

Er...
Lemme check that...

I'm pretty sure he said that while there is no proof of contact, the subject needs serious investigation. You are completely right saying he doesn't provide any proof that aliens are a reality. But you are also being completely irrelevant by saying it.

Mind, that a UFO is an unidentified flying object. He is certainly provided proof of flying objects, some of them that have indeed yet to be identified.

 

[leafman91]

Oi! Where'd this whole extra page spring from?

 

[SnidelyW]

Stray Cat;

I think this is a good example of a photo which meets your criteria.

Taken in Rouen, France, 1957. Flying to intercept a mysterious radar reflection, an unknown French Air Force pilot photographed this in March 1957 over Rouen with his gun-sight camera. The UFO paced the plane for several minutes before speeding off past the maximum velocity of the French airplane. This UFO appears to be of the same type that appeared in McMinnville, Oregon, over the farm of Mr. Paul Trent. It was first published in the Royal Air Force Flying Review in July, 1957.

 

[SnidelyW]

Here is the McMinnville, Oregon photo referenced above.

 

[Stray Cat]

Stray Cat;

I think this is a good example of a photo which meets your criteria.

Taken in Rouen, France, 1957. Flying to intercept a mysterious radar reflection, an unknown French Air Force pilot photographed this in March 1957 over Rouen with his gun-sight camera. The UFO paced the plane for several minutes before speeding off past the maximum velocity of the French airplane. This UFO appears to be of the same type that appeared in McMinnville, Oregon, over the farm of Mr. Paul Trent. It was first published in the Royal Air Force Flying Review in July, 1957.

Well apart from the fact that it doesn't fit into your stated category of someone taking a photo that they later notice a UFO that they didn't notice at the time of taking the photo, yes, I'm sure we could look at this.
But are we still sticking to only examining the photo or are we allowed to expand the overall view and recount the long and misguided history of UFOlogy and further, the reliance upon the fog of time to build myths?

Remembering of course that even the Trent's McMinniville event wasn't properly investigated for about 20 years after it had happend.

 

[Stray Cat]

Here is the McMinnville, Oregon photo referenced above.

That's a bit unfair... we can do better than that.

Photo 1:

Photo 2:

But should we start with this event or the French one?

 

[Stray Cat]

And if you need a clearer photo of the scene:

 

[SnidelyW]

Here is an interesting photgraph, which apparently was only visible upon the development of the photo.

 

[SnidelyW]

The above photo was taken by a test pilot photographing this Martin B-57 aircraft over Edwards A.F.B. California in September, 1957.