UFOs: The Research, the Evidence

[Akhenaten]

Different order, but same class.

I'd phylum under a different name...

I can't just let that go unacknowledged.

 

[Belgian thought]

Not a lick of evidence to support the claim that aliens exist. Same old arguments from incredulity and ignorance. However, since much evidence has been provided to support the theory that gods made UFOs to get some mentally ill kid all frothed up to make himself look like an idiot on an Internet forum, and since that theory hasn't even been approached by Rramjet, it's safe to assume he has nothing to refute it. And since he's, you know, a scientist and all, that must mean he supports the gods theory!

The "UFOs = aliens" conjecture is getting it's ass seriously kicked here.

Not quite I am afraid, post 5738 - http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5600226&postcount=5738 - seems to disprove my seeing the vrigin Mary in the water droplet - and I swear I could see it, which I thought was evidence.

Still, I bow down to all the true scientists on this forum, and will accept these findings like a man.

 

[RoboTimbo]

Bingo anyone?

 

[Akhenaten]

We could use the same cards, and save resources for ET research blimp hunting locating the gods responsible for UFOs squid fishing.

 

[Belgian thought]

Bingo anyone?

Rules please?
And who does the calling, and how do the rhymes go?

I have a few:

"47 - Roswell's Heaven!"
"Secret area - 51!"
"UFO lies - 55!"

 

[Correa Neto]

42 will do for all.
Don't forget it.

And towels.

But be careful if lead masks are required(*).



Wonders if Rramjet or anyone else will get it...

 

[Belgian thought]

42 will do for all.
Don't forget it.

And towels.

But be careful if lead masks are required(*).



Wonders if Rramjet or anyone else will get it...

Beware of geeks bearing sweets....

 

[EHocking]

42 will do for all.
Don't forget it.

And towels.

But be careful if lead masks are required(*).



Wonders if Rramjet or anyone else will get it...

DON'T PANIC if you don't get the references, admittedly the last reference is quite obscure (meet me at 4:30, all will be explained at 6:30).

 

[Rramjet]

I stated:
Dr Maccabee merely implies that a 100W (or so) navigation light could easily be seen up to the regulated 1-3 miles. I don’t see how that is misrepresenting anything. The whole point is that navigation lights would pale into insignificance under the glare of kWs of squid boat light.

It is a legal requirement that the navigation lights must be distinct from any other running lights the boat may have. If they "pale into insignificance" they are not complying with that legal requirement.

It is quite obvious you have never seen a squid boat - let alone one that is fishing ….so according to you, squid boats have kWs (!)…of navigation lights (!) on them? Red ones and Green ones… and the satellite did not pick that up?! kWs of navigation lights…?!

“Designed and manufactured in New Zealand, the new state of the art LED navigation lamp provides class leading energy efficiency, reliability and safety. With an ultra low current draw of <3.5W for Port, Starboard and Stern combined and <1.5W for the anchor function, the power saving benefits are substantial compared to the 25W consumed by incandescent Tri-Colour lamps.” (http://www.hellamarine.com/default.asp?a=5&t=5&View=FullStory&newsID=76)

You also stated that a green light must show higher than (above any) other lights. [

[You did this merely because the photo you provided seemed to show “green” lights (changing the reality to suit your own unfounded hypothesis). You are blinded by confirmation bias here. You see a photo and assume from that (nonexistent) lights all over the place! The colours are an artefact.]

Show me anywhere in shipping regulations where this is regulated. It is regulated that they have green and red deck-level lights and either a tri-colour or white “steaming” light on the top (plus a white stern light). Interestingly, in your photo, none of these lights are visible…know why?…because the fishing lights overwhelm them and the camera exposure was necessarily too short to allow them to register in the photo.

There are two distinct green strip lights running along the lighting arm.
This has nothing to do with photographic artifact. Indeed it is completely contrary to what would be expected. The bright white lights would usually turn the photo orange (as does any non colour balanced bulb). The green of the strip lights is actually lessening this effect on the photo.
My knowledge of photo optics at night is quite obviously a lot more in depth than yours is, thank you.

The colours in your photo are an ARTEFACT! It is NOT a true representation of colour in the real world – those green “strips” are artifacts of the photo (either filters on the lens or in post processing, etc). There are NO “strip lights…NONE! The boat shown is also not a Japanese squid boat of any type used in the southern ocean.

No, I content that sometimes fishing boats try a few different places to see where the best catch is on any particular night. Between these fishing grounds the squid boat would be running under normal lighting.

Japanese squid boats don’t DO that… the Japanese operate in FLEETS in the southern ocean. They DO NOT go out singly. This is common knowledge in this part of the world… but of course you would never let the facts get in the way of a good story.

I'm not even going to try to speculate on the possible motives of a squid boat's captain for doing what ever at a particular time or place. It has been shown that there were several boats that could have been in that area so there is no need to speculate on any underhand motives when a boat could have been there quite legitimately.

Please show me the evidence for “several boats that could have been in that area”. You have NONE. You are simply making things up! But of course IMO this is typical of UFO debunker behaviour.

Here are some pictures you might find illuminating…

 

[Marduk]

I thought this is cool

Its a green strobe light
its attached to squid lines and is water activated
so as it flashes a green light on and off which the squid find very attractive
do you think its attractive Rramjet ?
http://www.blueoceantackle.com/squid_lights.htm
see apparently squid have a filtering pigment in their eyes which mean that they see green better than any other colour, squid fishermen are well aware of this and equip their boats with this in mind. This strobe which flashes brighter than any other light on the boat was specifically designed because of that too
of course, I expect you think they must be doing it wrong eh

 

[Rramjet]

I think I addressed this before. This is one of the few (quite possibly the only) things that Rramjet has actually ever got right. It is incredibly unlikely that we could detect stray transmissions from the daily activity of a human-level civilisation. See here, for example. A massive dedicated antenna array would have a chance of detecting our stray TV transmissions at 50 light years or so. An effort on the scale of SETI could only detect them at a fraction of that.

And it gets worse. With the development of digital, satellite and cable TV, the strength of stray transmissions is greatly reduced. If aliens aren't looking during the few decades between the invention of radio and these later developments, they have a much lower chance of seeing anything. Given that these are fairly obvious improvements, it seems likely we would face a similar problem detecting any alien transmissions.

Thank you Cuddles – sanity and scientific fact finally come to the fore!

Where Rramjet goes wrong (Rramjet wrong? Who'd have though it?) is in declaring that since it's unlikely we could detect alien TV signals, SETI must be a complete waste of time. Where he goes really incredibly wrong is that this claim directly contradicts his other claims. As I pointed out earlier, he say that we should spend SETI's resources on investigating aliens actually visiting Earth. But obviously if they're visiting Earth, the arguments about detectable range are utterly irrelevant. SETI is easily capable of detecting even very weak signals that are only a few hundred or thousand kilometres away at most.

So it's really very simple. If aliens are visiting us, as Rramjet claims, SETI would easily be able to detect them and isn't a waste of time. If aliens aren't visiting us, SETI may be very unlikely to detect them, but we don't currently have any alternatives and therefore it probably isn't a waste of time. However you look at it, Rramjet fails miserably.

Where YOU go wrong here is in the assumption that if ETI were here, they would be emitting signals that we could detect. This is by NO means certain.

Moreover you misconstrue what I am saying. I am not contending we look for signals from ETI at all (except perhaps if the atmosphere of another planet indicates the presence of life – then we might point a radio telescope at it in the off chance that some stray frequency has survived the journey – unlikely as that might be).

To add to all your very good points here, there's also the problem that looking at atmosphere's doesn't actually tell us anything much about life. The most we'd be able to say is that the planet's atmosphere has a similar composition to Earth's. Without going there to check, we wouldn't know if that was actually anything to do with life. On the other hand, this also assumes that all life must be similar to Earth's life, and would completely ignore any possible life that results in a different atmospheric composition. After all, Mars and Europa are thought to be two of the best candidates for finding traces of life, but neither has an atmosphere anything like ours.

“The one experiment that will attract the greatest attention from the public is the search for methane in the Martian atmosphere. Methane is solely produced by biological processes, and is quickly destroyed by light. Therefore, if any methane at all is found in the atmosphere, we can be almost certain that life exists on Mars right now.” ​

(http://library.thinkquest.org/C003763/index.php?page=exobio03)

There are also oxygen and carbon dioxide we can look at… On a distant planet we will be able to analyse the atmosphere by the absorption technique…simply light passing through the atmosphere splits into its component wavelengths and certain chemicals will cause “signature” dark bands (indicating markers for different chemicals) in that observed spectrum. This won’t be easy, but the technology to do so is getting better every day.

So once again Rramjet fails. Even if everything were as simple as he apparently believes, merely looking at atmospheres won't tell us anything much useful about the presence of advanced alien civilisations. His approach would be rife with false positives and false negatives, and given the difficulty in actually doing it, would likely be far less cost effective than the SETI he so hates.

Sorry Cuddles, but given that we are discovering planets now at an ever increasing rate so sooner or later we will be pinpointing “habitable” planets that we can start analysing for life. This would seem a far stronger proposition that SETI’s millions to one shot in the dark –and we are already doing it – so why waste money on SETI when it should be going toward the technology to aid the discovery of actual planets and potential life on them. THAT would seem to be the most productive path to take and would give us a greater chance of success than SETI ever could.

The resources wasted by SETI could also go toward finding out once and for all if UFOS actually DO represent ETI. No, SETI is simply a waste of resources, especially when more viable research paths are available.

 

[Stray Cat]

I stated:
Dr Maccabee merely implies that a 100W (or so) navigation light could easily be seen up to the regulated 1-3 miles. I don’t see how that is misrepresenting anything. The whole point is that navigation lights would pale into insignificance under the glare of kWs of squid boat light.

It is quite obvious you have never seen a squid boat - let alone one that is fishing ….so according to you, squid boats have kWs (!)…of navigation lights (!) on them? Red ones and Green ones… and the satellite did not pick that up?! kWs of navigation lights…?!

“Designed and manufactured in New Zealand, the new state of the art LED navigation lamp provides class leading energy efficiency, reliability and safety. With an ultra low current draw of <3.5W for Port, Starboard and Stern combined and <1.5W for the anchor function, the power saving benefits are substantial compared to the 25W consumed by incandescent Tri-Colour lamps.” (http://www.hellamarine.com/default.asp?a=5&t=5&View=FullStory&newsID=76)

If a squid boat was only fitted with the normal/standard LED navigation lights that are 3.5w, they would not be seen in the overpowering glare of the big bright white fishing lights... and therefore they would be breaking the regulation which I quoted above... As soon as you understand this basic principle of the regulations, come back with another ill thought out argument.

You also stated that a green light must show higher than (above any) other lights. [

[You did this merely because the photo you provided seemed to show “green” lights (changing the reality to suit your own unfounded hypothesis). You are blinded by confirmation bias here. You see a photo and assume from that (nonexistent) lights all over the place! The colours are an artefact.]

Fail again.
The page I linked (twice now and which you obviously haven't looked at) clearly shows that as well as the normal standard navigation light system, there are also a number of other lighting configurations that are vitally important to signal to other traffic, such as 'night time diving', 'tug boat towing' and 'active fishing boat'
Again, come back when you've a better understanding of the regulations.

Show me anywhere in shipping regulations where this is regulated.

Part C - Lights and Shapes:
26. Lights for fishing vessels Fishing Vessels
(a) A vessel engaged in fishing, whether underway or at anchor, shall exhibit only the lights and shapes prescribed in this Rule.(b) A vessel when engaged in trawling, by which is meant the dragging through the water of a dredge net or other apparatus used as a fishing appliance, shall exhibit: 1. two all-round lights in a vertical line, the upper being green and the lower white, or a shape consisting of two cones with their apexes together in a vertical line one above the other;2. a masthead light abaft of and higher than the all-round green light; a vessel of less than 50 metres (164 ft) in length shall not be obliged to exhibit such a light but may do so;3. when making way through the water, in addition to the lights prescribed in this paragraph, sidelights and a sternlight. Again, come back when you've a better understanding of the regulations.

The colours in your photo are an ARTEFACT! It is NOT a true representation of colour in the real world – those green “strips” are artifacts of the photo (either filters on the lens or in post processing, etc). There are NO “strip lights…NONE! The boat shown is also not a Japanese squid boat of any type used in the southern ocean.

Sadly detailed photos of Japanese squid boats operating at night are quite rare. As they are usually 'botched' together with swinging arms containing various different lighting types, you can not imply any sort of commonality.
And as a fully trained, qualified and experienced photographer, I'm telling you that the green colour in the photo does not come from any colour filter or colour cast caused by the artificial lighting. It is two clear and distinct green strip lights that run along the lighting rig arms.

Japanese squid boats don’t DO that… the Japanese operate in FLEETS in the southern ocean. They DO NOT go out singly. This is common knowledge in this part of the world… but of course you would never let the facts get in the way of a good story.

Sorry, I don't see any facts that Japanese squid boats don't do that.
Just because you say it is so, doesn't make it so.
And you claiming it to be "common knowledge" carries as much weight as a small bag of candyfloss in an alien anti-gravity chamber.

Please show me the evidence for “several boats that could have been in that area”. You have NONE. You are simply making things up! But of course IMO this is typical of UFO debunker behaviour.

Astrophotographer has already done that, you don't accept it.

Here are some pictures you might find illuminating…
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/picture.php?albumid=384&pictureid=2357
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/picture.php?albumid=384&pictureid=2356
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/picture.php?albumid=384&pictureid=2355

No, none of them are actually illuminating though are they... well maybe the top one, but then there's not much to see except an armada of alien space craft on the horizon.

 

[wollery]

I think I addressed this before. This is one of the few (quite possibly the only) things that Rramjet has actually ever got right. It is incredibly unlikely that we could detect stray transmissions from the daily activity of a human-level civilisation. See here, for example. A massive dedicated antenna array would have a chance of detecting our stray TV transmissions at 50 light years or so. An effort on the scale of SETI could only detect them at a fraction of that.

And it gets worse. With the development of digital, satellite and cable TV, the strength of stray transmissions is greatly reduced. If aliens aren't looking during the few decades between the invention of radio and these later developments, they have a much lower chance of seeing anything. Given that these are fairly obvious improvements, it seems likely we would face a similar problem detecting any alien transmissions.

Thank you Cuddles – sanity and scientific fact finally come to the fore!

Except, Cuddles and Rramjet, you're forgetting Active SETI - the attempt to send directed signals to aliens. Who's to say that there aren't aliens out there with their own version of Active SETI.

If we're doing it why wouldn't they?

 

[Stray Cat]

In view of the same old same old being touted as evidence on this thread.
And now Rramjet saying that SETI money could be better used by UFOlogists to determine if UFO = Alien presence already. I wonder exactly what would UFOlogists (Rramjet in particular) use the money for?

The way I see it, UFOlogists don't really want to find out, which is why they structure their myths in the way that they do... Promises of conclusive evidence on the horizon, constantly looking at old dusty cases that have had time to mature into fine vintage myths.

So Rramjet, instead of this constantly being some adversarial battle between the sceptics v you, why not outline some good methods you could introduce if the SETI money was put at your disposal.

Would you simply use it to write a book to join all the other books dragging up the stale old UFO anecdotes of the past?

 

[Astrophotographer]

So Rramjet, instead of this constantly being some adversarial battle between the sceptics v you, why not outline some good methods you could introduce if the SETI money was put at your disposal.

Very nice poster/book cover art. This has once again spiraled into tit-for-tat arguments. We can keep going back and forth over precise angles and distances based on anecdotal testimony, regulations about boats and ships, lighting arrangements, mystery lights, Anamolous propogation, etc. etc. etc. It will end with the same result. Rramjet will state that our explanations are invalid and could not possibly explain the events in question. He will then draw the conclusion that this is good evidence for it being ET/something unknown to science/not of this world/a craft operating under intelligent control (whatever catch phrase he wants).

I think the commentary at the end of the NOVA program is applicable:

It is impossible to prove conclusively what the New Zealand UFOs were. But like most UFO sightings, part of its interest lies in what it reveals about ourselves. Some people when confronted with unfamiliar lights in the sky like this feel the need to find an unusual explanation. For them, science has taken much of the mystery out of life and by concluding that the answer can be found in beings from other worlds, they return an element of mystery to our own world.

IMO, if we were to present postive evidence that a squid boat (or for that matter any water craft with bright lights) was definitely in Pegasus bay at the time in question, he would suggest the evidence is a fake (or was created by "debunkers"), that it could not be a boat that was recorded on the film, or that it did not matter if a boat was there or not. As always, it is a never ending cycle.

 

[tsig]

Your deliberate misrepresentation is becoming tiresome Correa Neto.

UFOs have demonstrated their capacity to operate "...outside the boundaries of what we take to be the limits of the natural world".

Obviously you have nothing to say about the subject so you decide to begin deliberately misrepresenting what I stated (many times AND directly to you). This is a typical UFO debunker modus operandi. When they cannot refute the evidence directly, they resort to deliberate distortions and misrepresentation. WHERE are your "scientific" principles now Correa Neto? LOL.

If they were operating "...outside the boundaries of what we take to be the limits of the natural world". then they were supernatural.

Supernatural = god so RR have you surreptitiously joined the goddit explanation?

 

[Tricky]

In view of the same old same old being touted as evidence on this thread.
And now Rramjet saying that SETI money could be better used by UFOlogists to determine if UFO = Alien presence already. I wonder exactly what would UFOlogists (Rramjet in particular) use the money for?

I'm guessing it would be used to travel around the world and collect anecdotal interviews with people who claim to have seen alien spacecraft. Possibly to reprocess fuzzy pictures and movies to get sharper resolution without actually positively identifying any of them. After all, there is no physical evidence like unearthly metals or alien DNA to run lab tests on.

 

[GeeMack]

I agree.

Throughout this thread, and the thread regarding 'aliens', Rramjet has been extremely cordial, patient, and consistent in his arguments.

Cordial? Hardly. But consistent? Yes, 100%. His argument is crap, consistently. It's a consistent argument from incredulity and ignorance. It's 100% consistent in that it is wholly lacking any support whatsoever for his claim that aliens exist.

He has shown respect for alternative points of view, and has handled the 'ganging up' on his arguments with aplomb.

I have never once been left with the impression he has deliberately misled anyone, and in fact, he has apologized when he has been shown to be in error.

Then you've been reading a different thread, or your understanding of phrases like "shown respect for alternative points of view" and "apologized when he has been shown to be in error" is quite different from the common English meaning of those phrases.

Whether one argues the rules of tiddlywinks or the existence of UFO's, most of us spend time here to learn, to expose ourselves to new points of view, and perhaps, just perhaps, change the way we look at certain events as a result of the learned discussion here.

Most of us. But the UFO believers in this discussion have shown a clear lack of willingness to learn and certainly haven't changed the way they look at their faith.

I think Rramjet should be held up as a fine example of respectful debate in the face of personal vilification, derision and scorn.

Perhaps you meant to say, more accurately, that his argument is often peppered with vilification, derision, and scorn?

I don't know about anyone else, but I am here to engage and debate in a respectful manner, and show those with whom I wish to debate as much respect as I wish to receive in return.

You're not here to engage in any sort of debate at all. Your argument, if you could call it that, is simply an acknowledgement that you're Rramjet's sycophant.

Those who pride themselves in intimidation, personal attacks and otherwise disrespectful behaviour just marginalize their opinions to the point where they are skimmed over and ignored.

In other words, when you're faced with the fact that you have nothing but arguments from incredulity and ignorance, taking an even firmer grip on incredulity and ignorance is a more effective way of maintaining your faith than dealing head on with the uncomfortable truth.

 

[tsig]

Are you now confirming that you subscribe to the "UFOs are gods" hypothesis?

I see we were both divinely inspired with the same idea. The proofs of god are multiplying like rabbits. Only a blind fool could miss them.

 

[Access Denied]

The following quotes from Rramjet are in reply to this post that he neglected to reference…

One wonders why Rramjet is promoting this case [New Zealand] as “evidence” for aliens when even Maccabee’s own peers, who are UFO proponents themselves, don’t find it compelling?

…or answer.

There is just a tiny detail you are missing in your "debunking" of Dr Maccabee...

He is only the messenger in this case. That is, we do not necessarily have to rely on his analysis at all.

First of all, that wasn’t “my” debunking of Maccabee and secondly, who’s “we”? You’re the one who’s relying solely on his presentation of the “facts” in this case.

“There are a lot of armchair theorists who think they can make judgements without doing any homework at all” ~ Stanton Friedman

What is of direct interest is the history (the sequence of events) of the case. That is - what the WATCC stated and saw; what the pilot and co-pilot stated and saw, what the cameraman stated, saw and filmed and what the reporter stated and saw (and at what times and positions all these occurred).

As filtered through Maccabee… how can you be sure all the relevant details and events have been presented to you? The fact is you can’t… especially given that I’ve already shown you evidence that Maccabee has a history of omitting or obfuscating “inconvenient” facts.

“What the public doesn't know, I won't tell them” ~ Stanton Friedman

The rest is peripheral to the case - That is, the case does NOT stand or fall merely on one man's analysis (no matter HOW expert and professional that analysis might be).

Unfortunately for you, it does… you have summarily rejected the research, analysis and opinions of everyone else based on your assumption that Maccabee has your best interests in mind and his “analysis” is sound. P.T. Barnum said "there's a sucker born every minute" and I’ve already shown you evidence that Maccabee withholds information from “pro” ETH researchers so what makes you think you’re any different and somehow immune to his sales pitch?

“If one can't attack the data, attack the people; it is easier” ~ Stanton Friedman

You CANNOT escape the FACTS of the case (even by trying to discredit the messenger).

I don’t need to “escape” anything… you’re the one who’s assuming you have all the necessary facts and placing all your faith in the messenger and his message. Good luck with that…

“Do one's research by proclamation; investigation is too much trouble” ~ Stanton Friedman

The FACTS are that there were a number of confirmed radar/visual conjunctions and at least one radar/visual/film conjunction.

As other have repeatedly demonstrated and you consistently ignore, no, that’s not a fact…

“Don't bother me with the facts, my mind is made up” ~ Stanton Friedman

This evidence clearly demonstrates that there was at least one very REAL object in the sky that night and it is THIS object that must be explained - no matter HOW odd it's behaviour might seem to us.

No, it doesn’t and no, it doesn’t have to be… clearly Maccabee has demonstrated that to you so now how are you going explain it? Let’s see your evidence of what it was…