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UFOs: The Research, the Evidence

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LissaLysikan said:
Kay - those were interesting.

(...)

And we're seeing a theme here - the age of these reports is 50 or more years. 50 years ago my parents weren't even embryos yet.

(...)

More and more, Rramjet, you are needing this evidence that aliens exist to support your position.
UFOs exist - we ALL accept that, but a non-mundane explanation for them is getting weaker. At the rate you are going you are going to convince us wannabe believers that there is nothing to believe in.
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LissaL You might want to visit my original post where I provided links to many more recent cases too. The list of cases I present there consists a body of evidence that I contend will support my contentions. There. :) you have a lot of what I am going to argue right up front!
 
Yes, I will post an apology right now for not actually testing those sublinks BEFORE posting the link.

I will be more careful in the future, and test all sublinks.
 
No one has mentioned Video evidence. With the proliferation of video cameras, cell phone video and static security video, what is the current acceptance level of video evidence?

As an opening example, there is some pretty compelling video evidence taken on August 6, 1997;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9H6sEbDLb1o
 
RoboTimbo said:
What contentions are those?

And do you think extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, yes or no?
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What exactly would you accept as 'extraordinary evidence'?

The issue I have with this demand is that if the standard of evidence is not stated in advance, skeptics will always have an 'escape' clause.

There are many extraordinary claims I could make to indigenous people in the most remote corner of New Guinea, for example, regarding the existence of radio waves, lasers etc.

It is possible for something to exist without leaving behind collectable evidence as a souvenir to us. For example, planes, radio waves, electromagnetism, and light move around without leaving "hard evidence" yet they exist. Therefore, extraordinary phenomena can easily exist without leaving behind extraordinary evidence.
 
Robo Timbo, take a look at the Mexico City video and let me know if you do not think it is 'extraordinary'.

I sure do.
 
Rramjet said:
Righhhht… Yeah…ooookay…. Sure…have it your way…. All that argument about blimps was…merely a word game… playing with semantics for the sheer and bloody minded hell of it then? (shrugs)
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Based on this it really does seem you haven't understood at all what most skeptics here have posted. At the risk of repeating a mantra, I'll say it again (and this will be the last I'll comment on the Rogue River case). This is how I see the end result through my young and curious critical eye:

The most honest, objective view possible regarding the Rogue River sighting must be that of it being an unidentified flying object. However, when pondering (for whatever reason) on what the UFO might have been if indentified, accounting all evidence available the most honest and objective stance has to include the possibility of it being of mundane origin. There is enough evidence presented in this thread to conclude that it might have been a blimp.

Also, in the light of no actual evidence for the possibility of it being of alien origin, the most honest and objective view must be of that there is greater probabilty in it being of mundane than of alien origin.

Rramjet said:
Therefore my contention that UFOs exist has then been verified by the evidence presented in the Rogue River case.
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I think it's safe to say most posters here have agreed on that from point 1.

Rramjet said:
One strict standard of evidence for me (having to prove BOTH the positive and the negative), another for them (having to prove nothing at all).
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I think it's really a shame (and a point of learning for skeptics) if you've felt that way. Because having followed the whole discussion through (also through threads before this) I can only say that, apart from a few malicious posters, you've been treated fair and square. Just like anybody claiming extraordinary things would be (and IMO should be).

Rramjet said:
A small lesson might then be in order and might illuminate what I mean about the burden of proof (and please I AM trying to be genuine and non-condescending here):
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I'm still very interested in this part of the whole debate. Since to me it's not yet clear what you are claiming (belief in something, or knowledge that something is). But this is not the time and place to dig deeper in it, not any more.

I will now also move on to:

Rramjet said:
Trans en Provence UFO (8 Jan 1981)
(http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/ciencia/ufo_briefingdocument/1981.htm)
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SnidelyW said:
...For example, planes, radio waves, electromagnetism, and light move around without leaving "hard evidence" yet they exist. Therefore, extraordinary phenomena can easily exist without leaving behind extraordinary evidence.
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That is not true for two reasons.

Firstly:
You can go find the plane in question and touch it and identify it. You can have radar recordings or flight plans for the plane in question.
Radio waves, EM, and light can all be measured with scientific instruments.
For instance, that's what SETI does. No aliens yet but they have found some neat quasars.

Secondly: None of those things are extraordinary. They're ordinary.

A craft or being which defies aeronautics or physics or biology as we know them would be extraordinary. And would require extraordinary proof. A picture, video, oral account, or any plurality of those is insufficient. You need to physically possess it to have the evidence of it. And even then you will need to present it for dozens of independent evaluations lest you have another version of the Piltdown Man.

So unless any of the woo woos have a ghost/ufo/bigfoot net out there that will function, give up.
 
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SnidelyW said:
For example, planes, radio waves, electromagnetism, and light move around without leaving "hard evidence" yet they exist. Therefore, extraordinary phenomena can easily exist without leaving behind extraordinary evidence.
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Sorry Snidley I'm off out in a bit so I'll take a look at your links when I get back.

I thought I'd briefly say this as quick as I can, so apologies if there's grammar and spelling mistakes: Please keep in mind I think I speak for nearly all the posters here when I say we would incredibly excited to discover any evidence of alien intelligence visiting here.

There are things for which direct observation or sampling is impossible (Although we have no reason other than the quality of the evidence provided so far to believe that UFO's are one of these), however what we have first to do in those cases is show the phenomena to be distinct from mundane causes and not potentially just a product of one of the many problems of detailed so far with evidence provided. This is the first step that Rramjet has appeared to have attempted here, but not succeeded (it still could be of mundane origin) and there's a little fingers in the ears over the whole thing now.

If you would like to understand more what level of evidence is required you could try reading about the conception of some of the more outlandish (sounding, at least when first heard) theories that we now hold to be fact, for example evolution (to a theistic scientific establishment) and some notable physics theories (a lot of which are infinitely weirder sounding that aliens visiting us) which do not include direct observation.
 
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BlackKat said:
That is not true for two reasons.

Firstly:
You can go find the plane in question and touch it and identify it. You can have radar recordings or flight plans for the plane in question.
Radio waves, EM, and light can all be measured with scientific instruments.
For instance, that's what SETI does. No aliens yet but they have found some neat quasars.

Secondly: None of those things are extraordinary. They're ordinary.

A craft or being which defies aeronautics or physics or biology as we know them would be extraordinary. And would require extraordinary proof. A picture, video, oral account, or any plurality of those is insufficient. You need to physically possess it to have the evidence of it. And even then you will need to present it for dozens of independent evaluations lest you have another version of the Piltdown Man.

So unless any of the woo woos have a ghost/ufo/bigfoot net out there that will function, give up.
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The use of the word 'extraordinary' was in reference to how isolated tribes in New Guinea may view the existence of those things.

To us, they're ordinary, but to them, extraordinary. As regards 'proof and methodology of providing same, if the New Guinea tribes do not have the faintest idea of instrumentation, how would you go about convincing a tribal skeptic they exist?

As far as your standards of evidence are concerned, if your only criteria is physically posessing evidence to actually believe it exists, there are better folks than me on this site who could rip that to shreds instantly.
 
Tapio said:
That, my friend, was such a load of dung I really can't fathom why/how someone would actually go through the trouble of writing it. Not talking about the video (I really don't give video's much, if any, wheight evidence-wise), but the 'discussion'...
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Okay- fair enough if you disagree with their assessment of the difficulties in 'faking' the video. I respect your views and opinions.

My research on the web has yet to discover any arguments whatsoever from skeptics regarding the 'Las Lomas' video.

If you can point me to them, I'd be happy to read them with an open mind.
 
SnidelyW said:
What exactly would you accept as 'extraordinary evidence'?

The issue I have with this demand is that if the standard of evidence is not stated in advance, skeptics will always have an 'escape' clause.
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Good point. You state what the extraordinary claim is and then I'll state in advance what extraordinary evidence would suffice. Rramjet is still weaseling out of stating his position, even though he has stated it and then retracted it after he realized his error.
 
StevenCalder said:
Sorry Snidley I'm off out in a bit so I'll take a look at your links when I get back.

I thought I'd briefly say this as quick as I can, so apologies if there's grammar and spelling mistakes: Please keep in mind I think I speak for nearly all the posters here when I say we would incredibly excited to discover any evidence of alien intelligence visiting here.

There are things for which direct observation or sampling is impossible (Although we have no reason other than the quality of the evidence provided so far to believe that UFO's are one of these), however what we have first to do in those cases is show the phenomena to be distinct from mundane causes and not potentially just a product of one of the many problems of detailed so far with evidence provided. This is the first step that Rramjet has appeared to have attempted here, but not succeeded (it still could be of mundane origin) and there's a little fingers in the ears over the whole thing now.

If you would like to understand more what level of evidence is required you could try reading about the conception of some of the more outlandish (sounding, at least when first heard) theories that we now hold to be fact, for example evolution (to a theistic scientific establishment) and some notable physics theories (a lot of which are infinitely weirder sounding that aliens visiting us) which do not include direct observation.
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I'll do some more reading on the subject for sure.

I am getting the distinct feeling of a possible parallel to the 'round earth' debate of the Middle ages.
There was widespread postulation from such famed thinkers as Plato and Aristotle (both performing their work in the third and fourth centuries B.C.) who agreed with the Pythagorian theory regarding the shape of the Earth (not to be confused with the Pythagorian theorem regarding right triangles, which is a different story altogether), based on observations of the curved horizon at sea as well as the shape of the Earth when seen casting a shadow on the moon during a lunar eclipse.

What I am driving at is that it took from 400 B.C. until 1492 to finally prove the 'round earth skeptics' wrong.

It seems this UFO debate has the hallmarks of taking at least that long.:)
 
RoboTimbo said:
Good point. You state what the extraordinary claim is and then I'll state in advance what extraordinary evidence would suffice. Rramjet is still weaseling out of stating his position, even though he has stated it and then retracted it after he realized his error.
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I would not, and will not, claim I am an expert on UFO phenomena. There are others here who have spent over 20 years delving into the subject, and I respect their opinions.

From where I sit, the video of the August 6, 1997 Mexico City event has my attention.

I cannot explain it, and my searches on the web have heretofore been unable to provide me with any refutation of the video, or its contents.

So, my extraordinary claim would be that the flying object on the Mexico City video defies any known method of flight.
 
SnidelyW said:
I'll do some more reading on the subject for sure.

I am getting the distinct feeling of a possible parallel to the 'round earth' debate of the Middle ages.
There was widespread postulation from such famed thinkers as Plato and Aristotle (both performing their work in the third and fourth centuries B.C.) who agreed with the Pythagorian theory regarding the shape of the Earth (not to be confused with the Pythagorian theorem regarding right triangles, which is a different story altogether), based on observations of the curved horizon at sea as well as the shape of the Earth when seen casting a shadow on the moon during a lunar eclipse.

What I am driving at is that it took from 400 B.C. until 1492 to finally prove the 'round earth skeptics' wrong.

It seems this UFO debate has the hallmarks of taking at least that long.:)
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It could be, or it could be like the millions of other strange theories man has proposed over the years that have yet to confirmed or turned out to be nothing but complete fantasy.

You can't blame the sceptics if we can't say with certainty from the evidence:

Evidence X allows us to state with a reasonable certainty that Alien Intelligence is visiting the planet earth.

The failure of the evidence is the failure of the evidence, not a failure of the sceptics. If you decide to go beyond the evidence, you take a gamble, for every correct un-evidenced assertion there's a thousand incorrect ones.

Anyway I'll take a look at your links when I get back, Apparently sitting talking on forums when I'm supposed to be getting ready to go out isn't being a supportive and helpful boyfriend, Who Knew?!
 
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Rramjet said:
Do you see?
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I see that you ignored what I said about the weight of existing evidence and my explicit definition of an extraordinary claim.

Please address those elements, they are the foundation for my entire point.
 
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