Merged Is ufology a pseudoscience?

Rramjet said:
Which is of course precisely the point we have been making all along:

  • Ufology does not claim to be a science.
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Wrong on your very first point.

I can't understand how you and ufology are still trying to make people believe this.

The vast majority of so called "ufologists," including the largest ufologist organizations, do claim to be doing science, or at least that is their objective, as has been shown repeatedly in this thread.

That a few "ufologists" like you two claim not to does not prove any point at all.
 
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Rramjet said:
Which is of course precisely the point we have been making all along:

Ufology does not claim to be a science.
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Uh huh.
The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry :rolleyes:

Ufology can legitimately use scientific methodologies without it being a science (History is a good example).
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I don't think you'll find many historians formulating null hypotheses, and testing them whilst controlling for unwanted variables. And not many ufologists either, come to that.

There are quacks and charlatans in every discipline (medicine is a good example) but we do not write off the whole field as pseudosceince.
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But unlike medicine, there is no area of ufology that rigorously uses the scientific method. If it did, then we could legitimately call this bit scientific.

The study of UFOs can obviously be a legitimate and scientific pursuit - and just because people may disagree - that alone does not mean the study of UFOs is (merely on the basis of that disageement) therefore necessarily pseudoscience.
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True that ufology is not a pseudoscience just because some people say it is, but see here for why ufology is a pseudoscience.
 
Stray Cat said:
You obviously weren't following the complex plot, it was full of secret German anti-gravity water that doesn't weigh anything. :D
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You know, that's because they run out of heavy water after the Norwegian heavy water sabotage campaign.

See? That's exactly how pseudoscience, pseudohistory and tabloid journalism merge to build UFOlogy lore- cobble together and modify unrelated material (quite often of dubious origin) to build a fantasy.
 
Rramjet said:
Which is of course precisely the point we have been making all along:

[*]Ufology does not claim to be a science.
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Which is of course precisely what people have been telling you doesn't have to happen.

[*]Ufology can legitimately use scientific methodologies without it being a science (History is a good example).
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Therefore attempting to use science. Yep, UFOlogy is a pseudoscience just like homeopathy.

[*]There are quacks and charlatans in every discipline (medicine is a good example) but we do not write off the whole field as pseudosceince.
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UFOlogy is rife with quacks and charlatans. In fact, you were asked for examples of UFOlogists who aren't and you couldn't come up with any. I certainly can't think of any UFOlogists who aren't quacks and charlatans. Remember your "null hypothesis"?

[*]The study of UFOs can obviously be a legitimate and scientific pursuit - and just because people may disagree - that alone does not mean the study of UFOs is (merely on the basis of that disageement) therefore necessarily pseudoscience.
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You are correct. It is only when the pseudoscientists have a conclusion such as "aliens" or OMG PsuedoAliens or ET or engage in pseudoscientific proclamations such as "positively defy plausible mundane explanation" that it becomes pseudoscience.

So have you thought of any who aren't quacks and charlatans? Nope, me either.
 
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Rramjet said:
If the UFO debunkers are correct and UFO reports principally arise from misidentified mundane objects, then there should be no difference on defined characteristics (shape, speed, etc) between “known” reports and “unknown” reports.

Sure, no problem.

You take a descriptive characteristic (say a shape) and note its incidence in both the known and the unknown reports. The hypothesis states that we should expect the incidences to be evenly distributed between reports (if all objects are merely misidentified mundane objects then we expect it will be). Then we run (for example) a Chi-square analysis to see if the observed incidence statistically differs from the expected incidence. A simple and straightforward test of the hypothesis.
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You have of course done this and we can see your results..
 
Stray Cat said:
You obviously weren't following the complex plot, it was full of secret German anti-gravity water that doesn't weigh anything. :D
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That must have been the water they used to construct the bomb that won them the war. Oh wait.
 
tsig said:
That must have been the water they used to construct the bomb that won them the war. Oh wait.
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You know what went through my mind whilst watching that ridiculous piece of UFO hunting nonsense was that "if" the Germans had had any real effective technology (anti-gravity bell, flying saucer, space ships etc), how could they lose against an enemy that simply harvested the principles of scimming a stone across a lake (Barnes Wallis' bouncing bomb) and a plane made out of ply wood (the Spitfire) amongst other relatively low tech hardware.

Yes, OK Germany had some good scientists and they had the luxury of being properly funded and resourced by the Nazis, but the only real thing to come out of that as a direct result of the Nazis, that has achieved any sort of longevity is the VW Beetle (and only one of those has been given the power to venture into outer space). :D
 
Stray Cat said:
You know what went through my mind whilst watching that ridiculous piece of UFO hunting nonsense was that "if" the Germans had had any real effective technology (anti-gravity bell, flying saucer, space ships etc), how could they lose against an enemy that simply harvested the principles of scimming a stone across a lake (Barnes Wallis' bouncing bomb) and a plane made out of ply wood (the Spitfire) amongst other relatively low tech hardware.

Yes, OK Germany had some good scientists and they had the luxury of being properly funded and resourced by the Nazis, but the only real thing to come out of that as a direct result of the Nazis, that has achieved any sort of longevity is the VW Beetle (and only one of those has been given the power to venture into outer space). :D
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I think the rocket had some staying power.
 
wollery said:
I think the rocket had some staying power.
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Eventually yes.
But it's an awful long way from "chucking a load of fuel to produce thrust" to developing an anti-gravity machine speculated in the UFO hunters. :)

I could have been a bit more precise in my post I agree but I was more thinking about the vast and obvious gaps between the fantasy which is speculated and what is actually available.
 
zooterkin said:
Wasn't that the Mosquito, not the Spitfire?
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I'm fairly sure there's a rule that says every time someone mentions Spits I'm allowed to post a picture of one.



Spitfire.jpg
 
Akhenaten said:
I'm fairly sure there's a rule that says every time someone mentions Spits I'm allowed to post a picture of one.



[qimg]http://www.yvonneclaireadams.com/HostedStuff/Spitfire.jpg[/qimg]​
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That's a rule I can't argue with. :) Does that come with sound?

Not likely to be mistaken for a UFO, though this might be:
 
Stray Cat said:
You know what went through my mind whilst watching that ridiculous piece of UFO hunting nonsense was that "if" the Germans had had any real effective technology (anti-gravity bell, flying saucer, space ships etc), how could they lose against an enemy that simply harvested the principles of scimming a stone across a lake (Barnes Wallis' bouncing bomb) and a plane made out of ply wood (the Spitfire) amongst other relatively low tech hardware.

Yes, OK Germany had some good scientists and they had the luxury of being properly funded and resourced by the Nazis, but the only real thing to come out of that as a direct result of the Nazis, that has achieved any sort of longevity is the VW Beetle (and only one of those has been given the power to venture into outer space). :D
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UFOlogists doing even more pseudoscience, bad journalism, conspiracy theories and sheer madness:
(pseudo)History Channel's "Ancient Aliens"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liij60kXU8Y

Here's a summary of the epic show of nonsense- it startes with a saucer crashing in Nazi Germany and "evolves" through antigravity, "vortex activity, giroscopic activity could be harnessed with liquids, water , mercury", biologic vaccuum, vimanas, the Vril Society, haunebu saucers, swastikas' extraterrestrial connections, pseudoarcheology, the ark of the covenant, Einsten, nuclear basts at Harappa, Sodom and Gommorah, the henge, the bell, time travels and at last has top Nazis landing at Kecksburg with their time machine as the grand finale...

This is the type of garbage Rramjet and ufology want us to accept. This is what they are claiming not to be pseudoscience.
Check at 10'44" and 31'20"- if that's not psedoscientific technobabble WTF is that?

Its just a collection of tales, says, ufology. Not exactly- those guys are actually presenting a composite of distorted and false historic facts and pseudoscience tp back paranoid fantasies and preconceived concepts. Oh, and also making some profit over it all.

Some call themselves "investigative journalists", "directors", "authors" and the MUFOn guy presents himself as a "PH.D". Sounds like appeals, attempts to gain credibility... And this is a trade mark of...

This is utter BS, crackpottery. UFOlogy is not jus pseudoscience, its also pseudohistory, paranoid CTs, kookery. UFOlogy is a failure when it comes down to "finding the truth".
 
I feel that the following quoted post belongs also in this thread to illustrate how a pseudoscientist works. This is a better thread for its discussion.
Rramjet said:
Oh yes, you are right of course (trying to do too many things at once LOL) - hoaxes and delusions etc may of course be considered to be mundane explanations -there is a difference between those explanations and “natural object/phenomenological” explanations – but I don’t have time to go into that just now.
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Notice that the pseudoscientist initially insisted that hoaxes and delusions weren't mundane explanations until someone who doesn't claim to be a scientist pointed it out to him that they are, in fact, quite mundane.

It is not a null hypothesis because the null hypothesis is directionless - it proposes no difference, no effect, or no specific outcome.
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A real scientist, wollery, had to scold him on this, reminding Rramjet that a null hypothesis is a hypothesis.

"All UFO sightings are the result of mundane explanations." postulates a specific explanation for UFO sightings. It has a favoured direction.
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Rramjet seemed to be saying here that he didn't like null hypotheses that point in the direction of "the known". A pseudoscientist would definitely not want to go that direction!

The null hypothesis would be something along the lines of what I stated above:

If UFO reports result from mundane explanations then we would expect no difference on defined characterisitics between known and unknown reports.
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And here (in the other thread) wollery educates him on the difference between a null hypothesis and a test of a null hypothesis.

Science - falsifiable null hypothesis with no assumptions
Pseudoscience - fight against that null hypothesis with every fiber of your being because they have no way of falsifying it, shattering the delusion.

wollery was able to reword my layman's version of a null hypothesis with a better worded one:

"All UFO sightings are mundane in origin."​
From science's standpoint, this one makes sense. It makes no assumptions about unknowns or unprovens.

From pseudoscience's standpoint, this one is anathema. The pseudoscience of UFOlogy wants the null hypothesis to be "Some UFO sightings are the of ET origin."

That one is pseudoscience because it makes the assumption that ET is visiting the earth when there is no evidence of such. It illogically shifts the burden of proof. It begins with the conclusion that ET is visiting the earth.

Rramjet rightly chose not to respond to arguments in the other thread, perhaps thinking that this thread would be a better place for such discussion.

wollery's post is here: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=7435462#post7435462

That's one that Rramjet never responded to
 
AdMan said:
Rramjet said:
Which is of course precisely the point we have been making all along:

  • Ufology does not claim to be a science.
Click to expand...


Wrong on your very first point.

I can't understand how you and ufology are still trying to make people believe this.

The vast majority of so called "ufologists," including the largest ufologist organizations, do claim to be doing science, or at least that is their objective, as has been shown repeatedly in this thread.

That a few "ufologists" like you two claim not to does not prove any point at all.
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Lest we forget:

Rramjet said:
...believe me, I am a trained scientist and peer-reviewed published author in scientific journals
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http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?p=5215835#post5215835

↑​
There you see that Rramjet himself has made the very explicit pretense to science that he now insists ufologists do not make.

How much more evidence do we need that this claim is a lie?

:boggled:
 
It appears that Rramjet has fled the thread voluntarily with no argument against UFOlogy being a pseudoscience.

A pity, I was hoping he would make an attempt at defending his version of a null hypothesis and explain why the null hypothesis phrased by a real scientist would not apply.

Real falsifiable null hypothesis as phrased by wollery:
"All UFO sightings are mundane in origin"​

Pseudoscientific null hypothesis as given by Rramjet:
"If UFO reports result from mundane explanations then we would expect no difference on defined characterisitics between known and unknown reports"​

The first point I would raise with Rramjet's version:

Where do hoaxes fit in? What are a hoax's "defined characteristics"? I think you've mentioned color, shape, size, speed, etc. Any chance of you explaining why your version is not pseudoscientific?
 
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