Do you know how many reliable witnesses have seen BigfootI agree to a point. It would be nice to have video, but unlike dann, I do not agree that the lack of video automatically equates to the dozens of reliable eye-witnesses lying, being wrong or being mistaken.
Doveryay, no proveryay.... trust but verify.
Do you know how many reliable witnesses have seen Bigfoot
Surely they are not all wrong, lying or mistaken.
How about the old skeptical cliche:
The plural of anecdote is not 'data'.
How about the old skeptical cliche:
The plural of anecdote is not 'data'.
To expect it to be videoed, and making a positive claim that it is NOT happening because it is NOT videoed is just complete BS, and indicative of a mind that is closed and bolted shut.
Not sure what to make of this. Very interesting discussion, though.
Also, the more general discussion around whether or not eyewitness accounts count, that is interesting to me. Again, undecided where I myself stand on that.
One thing dann said, that makes sense to me: Should some people in a position of authority actually believe this thing about birds deliberately starting fires: Wouldn't they be out clamoring to have these birds shot? To have people with guns accompany firefighting teams, tasked with shooting down these arsonists? (ETA: Maybe pre-emptively just kill all birds of those species if seen in areas where they might pose a risk?)
Not sure what to make of this. Very interesting discussion, though.
Also, the more general discussion around whether or not eyewitness accounts count, that is interesting to me. Again, undecided where I myself stand on that,
One thing dann said, that makes sense to me: Should some people in a position of authority actually believe this thing about birds deliberately starting fires: Wouldn't they be out clamoring to have these birds shot? To have people with guns accompany firefighting teams, tasked with shooting down these arsonists? (ETA: Maybe pre-emptively just kill all birds of those species if seen in areas where they might pose a risk?)
(That last doesn't speak to the claim itself, but to how strongly the eyewitnesses believe what they say they saw. And I don't mean this rhetorically, like I said I'm not taking any position on this: it's possible they did ask that this be done, but their demand was turned down by unbelieving authorities. Or maybe in one or two cases there are indeed gun-toting bird killers accompanying firemen? Might be interesting to know, should this info be available.)
Hand-waving away inconvenient evidence that might go against a preferred narrative is usually par for the course when it comes to conspiracy theorists, not skeptics.
Except for Bigfoot?How about this old legal cliche:
Eye witness accounts are not anecdotes
You ever going to stop the pejorative comments and absurd comparisons to Bigfoot and UFOs ?
Your continuous dissing of rangers and others reporting behavior is disrespectful and only reflects on you in a very negative manner.
To be a skeptic means to be informed about the topic...you are not.
Neils Bohr could be skeptical of Einstein and be respectful despite their differences..... that's the standard.
Rangers and other respected professionals have reported seeing Bigfoot. ( ...and UFOs )
I'm not saying birds don't intentionally start/spread fires, I'm just saying we shouldn't be dropping our standards of evidence because we find ourselves suddenly credulous for one reason or another.
Except for Bigfoot?
Myth: Eyewitness Testimony is the Best Kind of Evidence
I just picked this out of hundreds of articles.
Eric Weinstein who some people think is a physics genius who has invented a theory that goes beyond Einstein, claims that there is some guy in government, who he has never met, who has classified information about UFOs that he wants Eric to have. Eric is a smart guy so knows this guy is for real and not pulling an elaborate prank on him. But the guy has kept having to cancel their meetings over the last three or four years.
Asked by moderator Alex Klokus, founder and managing partner of Salt Fund, if he believes intelligent extraterrestrials have ever visited Earth, Nolan said that not only does he believe they have been here in the past, but that they are here right now.
“It’s been here a long time,” Nolan said of his suspicions that an exotic form of intelligence may be lurking nearby.
“And it’s still here,” he added.
You ever going to stop the pejorative comments and absurd comparisons to Bigfoot and UFOs ?myths about fire-spreading birds they heard from aboriginal Australians, is it?!
Anthropologists wouldn't even be particularly reliable witnesses in the case of Bigfoot observations unless we were talking about the observation of a whole flange of 'Bigfeet' and their interaction or about the bodies of dead samples. In that case, an anthropologist might be able to tell us something about their burial rituals:
Your continuous dissing of rangers and others reporting behavior is disrespectful and only reflects on you in a very negative manner.
To be a skeptic means to be informed about the topic...you are not.
Neils Bohr could be skeptical of Einstein and be respectful despite their differences..... that's the standard.
....
Show me the part where it says eye-witness accounts are not evidence.
If eye-witness accounts don't count as evidence, then the courts and the judicial system will be in very deep poodoo, and there are a LOT of people who will have been convicted without any legitimate evidence against them.
Firstly, the claim is that fires are spread by birds, not started by them.
Secondly, the proportion of existing fires that have been claimed to have been spread by birds would be minuscule compared the number of fires spread by other known means, winds and embers alighting in unburned places.
Thirdly, the birds in question are all raptors. Since 1971, all raptors in Australia have been protected by legislation. Killing them attracts a fine up to AU$10,000 per bird.
It is interesting to me, too, and extremely relevant for the discussion in this thread.
I don't think there is one way to stand on eyewitness accounts. It depends on what is supposed to have been witnessed and the bias of witnesses. Such accounts may be outright lies. Sometimes mere misunderstandings. We tend to 'see' what we would like to see. We report what we imagine we saw. Obvious examples of the latter are people's eyewitness reports from psychic seances. Or even from magic shows: 'But I saw him place it in his left hand!' No, you didn't!
Many of my arguments about the validity of eyewitness accounts in the case of fire-spreading birds have been moved to AAH.
I would say it's a case of culpable negligence not to have hunters with shotguns accompany firefighters in the bush, but I would prefer to see the firefighters accompanied by videographers even though it wouldn't convince people who believe in the story about fire-spreading birds: Proving a negative in this case can't really be done, not even on video, which is why the burden of proof lies with the people who claim that there's a there there.
I like the idea! Gun-toting bird killers accompanying firemen would be fairly easy to catch on camera!![]()
Mick West’s Twitter feed is hilarious. It’s a litany of people saying “oh yeah, what’s this then?” Shows a picture of a streetlight.
“It’s a streetlight!”
“Oh yeah, well what about this?” Shows picture of a balloon.
“It’s a balloon!”
“Oh yeah. And what about this?” Shows picture of a plane.
“It’s a plane!”
UFOs are actually a good analogy because we have plenty of eyewitness testimony from people who we might be inclined to believe are not mere fabulists. People who fly jets in the Navy, people who work for NASA. Eric Weinstein who some people think is a physics genius who has invented a theory that goes beyond Einstein, claims that there is some guy in government, who he has never met, who has classified information about UFOs that he wants Eric to have. Eric is a smart guy so knows this guy is for real and not pulling an elaborate prank on him. But the guy has kept having to cancel their meetings over the last three or four years.
These people surely believe that UFOs are real because not ALL the pictures can be wrong can they? Maybe 90% or so are fake. That still leaves loads of real ones, right? Also, what about ancient aliens, huh? There are pictures of them all over the world and also monuments and statues. So there we have it: eyewitness accounts, photographic evidence and even traditions that agree, oh and corn circles.
But no, I am of course joking. And yes, eyewitness accounts are notoriously unreliable as well.
The part where it says it's not reliable doesn't count?
But it NOT a good analogy in this case.
When people talk about eye-witnesses being unreliable, they are talking about identification of people and objects - a person sees a murder take place, one person stabs another. They might incorrectly identify the killer, but they still saw the murder take place!! They are mistaken about the person but not the event. Why is this? Its because an eye-witness seeing an object is NOT the same as an-eye witness observing something taking place.
If I observe an aircraft and identify it as an Airbus A320 when its actually a Boeing 737, I still saw something, I just misidentified what I saw.
If I observe an animal of some kind and identify it as Bigfoot when it is actually a Black Bear, I still saw something, I just misidentified what I saw.
If I saw a dark object moving across the sky and thought it was a UFO, and it turned out to be a large swarm of bees, I still saw something, I just misidentified what I saw.
If I see a large raptor land pick up a burning twig then fly off a few metres away and drop it on a patch of dry grass, what on earth could I have misidentified here?
The first three eye-witness accounts above are observations of a thing, an object, in which a misidentification took place, but the fourth is different, it is an account of an event taking place, where is the possible misidentification here?
I have already explained this before - anyone with a modicum of commonsense ought to be able to get this, and I am astonished that people who call themselves skeptics do not understand this very, very simple concept.
How about another skeptical cliché?Agreed
So?
Yes, but it only counts if it supports the position one has taken.
Wrong!
And silly. People misunderstand what they are seeing all the time. Have you heard of optical illusions?
This is a good one. We can soon start the thread: “experts agree: horses can surf now”
Because scores of people such as park rangers, who are very experienced with observing the behaviour of birds, over a period of more than 40 years, were all fooled by the exact same optical illusion... every time!
[qimg]https://www.dropbox.com/s/4exuos06bhrao3x/Datalaugh.gif?raw=1[/qimg]
If eye-witness accounts don't count as evidence, then the courts and the judicial system will be in very deep poodoo, and there are a LOT of people who will have been convicted without any legitimate evidence against them.
Firstly, the claim is that fires are spread by birds, not started by them.
Secondly, the proportion of existing fires that have been claimed to have been spread by birds would be minuscule compared the number of fires spread by other known means, winds and embers alighting in unburned places.
Thirdly, the birds in question are all raptors. Since 1971, all raptors in Australia have been protected by legislation. Killing them attracts a fine up to AU$10,000 per bird.
Wait. Before you switch to that claim, you have to deal with the debunking of your claim that eye-witnesses are only ever fooled by objects, and never by events.
Then maybe deal with the fact that experts for forty years have been fooled by optical illusions when it comes to the behaviour of UFOs not merely identifying the object. This is why video evidence is required, so that eye witness accounts can be independently verified by others rather than merely adjudicated by people who may be predisposed to a particular interpretation.
Wait. Before you switch to that claim, you have to deal with the debunking of your claim that eye-witnesses are only ever fooled by objects, and never by events.
Then maybe deal with the fact that experts for forty years have been fooled by optical illusions when it comes to the behaviour of UFOs not merely identifying the object. This is why video evidence is required, so that eye witness accounts can be independently verified by others rather than merely adjudicated by people who may be predisposed to a particular interpretation.
But it NOT a good analogy in this case.
When people talk about eye-witnesses being unreliable, they are talking about identification of people and objects - a person sees a murder take place, one person stabs another. They might incorrectly identify the killer, but they still saw the murder take place!! They are mistaken about the person but not the event. Why is this? Its because an eye-witness seeing an object is NOT the same as an-eye witness observing something taking place.
If I observe an aircraft and identify it as an Airbus A320 when its actually a Boeing 737, I still saw something, I just misidentified what I saw.
If I observe an animal of some kind and identify it as Bigfoot when it is actually a Black Bear, I still saw something, I just misidentified what I saw.
If I saw a dark object moving across the sky and thought it was a UFO, and it turned out to be a large swarm of bees, I still saw something, I just misidentified what I saw.
If I see a large raptor land pick up a burning twig then fly off a few metres away and drop it on a patch of dry grass, what on earth could I have misidentified here?
The first three eye-witness accounts above are observations of a thing, an object, in which a misidentification took place, but the fourth is different, it is an account of an event taking place, where is the possible misidentification here?
I have already explained this before - anyone with a modicum of commonsense ought to be able to get this, and I am astonished that people who call themselves skeptics do not understand this very, very simple concept.
There's nothing to switch - that claim was never made. If you think it was.. show me.
But it NOT a good analogy in this case.
When people talk about eye-witnesses being unreliable, they are talking about identification of people and objects - a person sees a murder take place, one person stabs another. They might incorrectly identify the killer, but they still saw the murder take place!! They are mistaken about the person but not the event. Why is this? Its because an eye-witness seeing an object is NOT the same as an-eye witness observing something taking place.
*long-winded assertions giving chapter and verse supporting the claim that eye witnesses are unreliable in objects and people, but not events snipped*
Gee, I wonder how science got along before the invention of the Handycam?
Oh, and by the way, thank you for helping me out in post #632, for showing a fine example of how video evidence is unreliable...
Either the distinction between people/objects and events is meaningful or it is not.
...eye-witness testimony has not improved in value despite your attempts to make it.
No doubt various methods.
But you can be sure that anecdote alone was not sufficient.
You are now claiming that video evidence is unreliable?
And yet you claim that eye-witness testimony is? Wow! That is a rather crazy take-home message. Are you sure you want to stick on that?
Couldn't agree more!
Instead of looking at what is actually known about eyewitness reports, claims like the one about eyewitnesses being fooled only by objects rather than by events goes against everything we know. It's a typical making-it-up-as-we-go-along claim. One of those claims that any defense attorney would love to pick apart in a court of law.
Yes, it is! It's an extremely good analogy! Smartcooky's claim is an attempt to give credence to his idea that firemen and "university (!) anthropologists" for some reason are expert witnesses of bird behavior:
First of all, in the case of UFOs people not only see objects, they see objects moving in mysterious ways - even when the object is Venus, which tends to be fairly stationary during observations of the night sky even though be know it moves around a lot! It may be due to the foreground or background of those objects or it may be due to the apparent object being a reflection in the window through which something is being observed, or the observers themselves may be in an object that is moving: a car, a train, a ship, a plane.
Besides, it is very well documented by research (not just "people") that eyewitnesses are extremely bad at interpreting events, which shouldn't really come as a surprise to anybody: Events are usually more complicated, considered as objects of observation, than ordinary mere objects.
It is fascinating that smartcooky seems to be in denial of this fact that not only the vast majority of skeptics know about. Everybody has heard the stories, well-documented stories, about policemen, trained and experienced law enforcers, who kill innocent civilians because they (though they) saw them go for a gun that was never actually there. 'He was pulling. gun on me!' No, he wasn't. He was looking for his drivers license.
Yes, if smartcooky actually sees another plane, then that's what he does. And even if he sees the reflection of a bird in a window and mistakes it for a plane or a UAP, he still sees something, but he misinterprets it, which people do! And not just when they are dealing with objects ...
Even if he sees a bush, he still sees something. Robert Bartholomew's favorite Shakespeare quotation, which he has mentioned in almost all the podcasts and interviews he has participated in since the beginning of the 'syndrome': "Or in the night, imagining some fear, How easy is a bush supposed a bear!"
As for the behavior of inanimate objects like bushes and trees, this description is allegedly not uncommon in accident reports: "When they came into the left handed bend he he hit the brakes and then let the brakes off to steer through the bend. The statement continued: "Then I saw a tree coming towards me."" (Mirror) That one also reminds me of Shakespeare!
Beware of the "just" because that's what people do when they observe. It's a well-known fact: Observations are never mere observations. They are interpretations, and far too often, misinterpretations, misidentifications - be it of an object or of a sequence of events.
Really? It is what-on-earth unimaginable what could have been misidentified in a situation where birds are there to pick up stuff? A very well-known fact! The expert witnesses see the birds actually picking up something! They may have seen it several times. A whole flock of birds picking up stuff. Again and again. Because that's what the birds are there for! To pick up prey fleeing from or rendered incapable of fleeing by the fire, and taking off with that prey.
A bird may even occasionally mistake a twig for a burnt grasshopper or lizard, taking off with it and dropping it when it doesn't feel or taste right.
Besides, you have flames, you have smoke, and you have the tense situation that smartcooky likes to refer to as an excuse for never having caught any footage of those allegedly fire-spreading birds, but somehow those conditions never seem to occur to him when he describes the observations done by professional firemen and university anthropologists.
See explanation, actual explanation, above! The possibilities of misidentification aren't hard to find - if one is actually looking for instead of being in denial of them.
First of all, misinterpreting events or even objects has nothing to do with common sense. Our common sense is used by magicians to trick us. I have used common-sense references to explain it in this thread, so I think it's time to go beyond common-sense arguments. Look at what science tells us. We have already posted links to a couple of scientific articles about eyewitness reports, which seem to be ignored, so here are a couple of videos:
Witness descriptions after an event:
The Eyewitness Test: How do you stack up?
This video answers the question: How can what we've seen turn into something we never saw?
The Bad Science of Eyewitnesses
Eyewitness Testimony
Eyewitness testimony accuracy experiment - memories of a short film clip
Why eyewitnesses get it wrong - Scott Fraser (TED talk)
Why eyewitnesses fail | Thomas Albright (TEDx talk) "Our misinformed biases caused us to perceive things that don't exist."
Brain Games- False Memory and Misinformation Effect
And let me return to my thread about another theme where eye(and particularly: ear)witness reports have caused an awful lot of damage to a whole nation of 11 million people:
The 'syndrome' sufferers in Havana did indeed hear something! They even had the presence of mind to record it in the middle of imaginary supersonic attack on their brains, and they were even more likely to record their anomalous health incidents after they were told by their superiors to do so, which is why we have so much 'evidence' material in the case of the attacks' on U.S. diplomats and spooks.
They not only misinterpreted the sound itself. They also misinterpreted the behavior of the sound at the events! Even a moronic doctor of science, David Relman, the head of two of the 'Havana syndrome' investigative groups, the ones that came up with NASEM's and the Expert Panel's reports, had no idea how sound, quite ordinary sound, behaves. Because of his bias, his interest in finding zebras or unicorns when he should be expecting to see horses (another one of Bartholomew's favorite references), is the reason why he doesn't seem to understand that you [http://www.internationalskeptics.co...start hearing it again when you go back to it! I kid you not! That is how ******* dumb respected scientists (NASEM!) can be.
(And as for my alleged disrespectfulness and dissing of firefighters. I don't diss them. It is insane to claim that it is in any way disrespectful to them to say that they are no different from ordinary people in the respect that they can screw up when delivering eyewitness reports. This, on the other hand, is me being being 'dissing' alleged experts.
By the way, James Randi was being disrespectful to experts all the time when they didn't deserve respect. I see no reason why one shouldn't be. I feel like I'm paying tribute to Randi when I am!![]()
Reserved respect for people who deserved it. Their titles don't make them worthy of respect.)
anyone with a modicum of commonsense ought to be able to get this, and I am astonished that people who call themselves skeptics do not understand this very, very simple concept.
Horsecock!
Stop making stuff up. When you said "your claim that eye-witnesses are only ever fooled by objects, and never by events" it was a false characterization of what I have been saying.
Either show me where I said that or withdraw the statement... as the old saying goes, its time to "put up or shut up".
You are making stuff up again. All I have ever said is that it should not be summarily dismissed out of hand. I have never said or implied that eye-witness testimony has "improved" (whatever that means). Either show me where I said that or walk back your false claim.
Name them!
Eye-witness accounts are NOT anecdotes
Let me remind you that it was YOU who posted a video showing an optical illusion, thereby demonstrating that video sometimes cannot be relied upon. This is what you were trying to claim.. wasn't it?
(See what it feels like to have other poster lying falsely characterizing your words? Not very nice, is it?)
More mischaracterization!
Yes or No. Do you believe that eye-witness accounts should always be summarily dismissed out of hand? (and no equivocating!)
It's truly amazing that someone can, first of all, state that witness testimony is great evidence, on a skeptic site, and then say this doozy....
Eye-witness testimony is, for almost all forms of woo, the go-to fall-back from ghosts, to UFOs, to cold-reading, hot-reading, cryptozoology, alternative medicine, supplements for body building, cupping, acupuncture, Ouija boards, pretty much everything...!
There is, in this thread, an almost parodical run-down of woo techniques to beat the skeptical into submission. "Ah, but didn't people say the same about the Coelacanth!?" motte-and-bailleys "Ah, people dismiss folklore, but there is a lot of folklore that may have a basis in reality!" OR "birds can do some smart things!" or attempted burden shifting "Prove the testimony isn't real!", goalpost moving "maybe birds do it unintentionally" (LOL!) claimes people just aren't open-minded enough. "There is more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of in your philosophy, Horatio!" or appeals to authority, "This guy is an anthropologist! If anyone should know about birds, it is an anthropologist! Stop smirking at the back!" there are arbitrary distinctions of epistemology unknown to either philosophy or psychology, "unreliability refers to objects and persons, but not to events, dear boy! Events are of a fundamentally different quality just as base metal is to gold!"
Maybe the birds do indeed do this, but so far the evidence looks scant. A paper in a low-impact journal that, when I browsed the titles of other papers, seemed to accept a fair amount of, let's be kind, hippy-ish claims in their papers about how maybe certain indigenous tribes around the world have things to teach the rest of us. No doubt they do, and this is worth exploring, but it is not worth credulously accepting unless the evidence rises to the level we would ordinarily accept for other claims.