Most interesting UFO incidents thread

[Resume]

The point was not that they never existed, but that absence of evidence of any LIVING coelacanths convinced just about everyone they were extinct. One of the biggest epistemological problems people have is jumping to conclusions over an absence of evidence.

No, the point is that physical evidence for coelacanths exists; it does not for ET.

Unless you want to go with your testimony thing, which is an anecdote, which is a claim, which needs to be corroborated by . . . other evidence. Physical, objective evidence preferably.

So, do you have any?

 

[Stray Cat]

There's evidence, just not good evidence. Testimony is evidence.

Testimony is a claim, it needs to be backed up by evidence, a claim can not be evidence that a claim is accurate.

And every testimony regarding UFOs that has ever been successfully resolved has turned out to be not an alien craft.

You still haven't proven which should be the null hypothesis. The evidence for "aliens have never visited earth" is just as non-existent as the converse.

You're being silly. If there is no evidence for the existence of something, the default position is that the something does not exist. If someone wishes to challenge that position, then they have to provide evidence that the position is wrong. Provide just one single example of that thing and you've falsified the null hypothesis.
When I leave my house, I don't have to take precautions against being trampled to death by a heard of invisible pink unicorns on the off chance that they exist because no one has proven that they don't exist. The null hypothesis is that they don't exist... same with aliens visiting our planet.

When there's no good evidence one way or another, there often is no null hypothesis. Example: if I show you a coin, there is no null hypothesis about which side it will land on.

But both sides of the coin can clearly be shown to exist... see the difference there?
The null hypothesis would be that the coin would land on one side or the other. If someone claimed it wouldn't, but it would turn into a butterfly and fly away, then they would have to show one single example of that happening. Until they did, the null hypothesis would be that the coin would land on one side or the other.

 

[RoboTimbo]

That's not how it works. YOU'RE making the positive claim, not me: "No aliens have ever visited earth". The variables in the Drake Equation are so speculative, agnosticism is the only justifiable position to take.

No, I'm going with the null hypothesis, as I already stated. If you want to assert that some UFO's are alien craft then you're making a positive claim. Do you know the difference between a positive and a negative claim?

Where are you expecting to see evidence of aliens? SETI?

I'm not expecting it at all. Where are you keeping it?

Huh? When did I ever assert that?

When did I ever assert that intelligent life doesn't exist anywhere in the universe?

Since I'm not making that claim, this point is irrelevant.

Then why are you arguing against the null hypothesis?

To show how absurd it is. What percentage of the universe have we examined? Yet you're making a positive claim that no exist. Why stop there? Have we ever observed liquid water on any planet other than Earth? Does that mean liquid water only exists on Earth?

You're welcome to battle the strawman you've set up but you're doing it all by yourself.

 

[Fudbucker]

No, the point is that physical evidence for coelacanths exists; it does not for ET.

Irrelevant, as I never claimed ET's exist. I merely argue they possibly exist and possible build alien craft. This is the correct epistemological position to take.

Unless you want to go with your testimony thing, which is an anecdote, which is a claim, which needs to be corroborated by . . . other evidence. Physical, objective evidence preferably.

No. Anecdotes do not need to be corroborated to count as evidence. They can quite easily stand on their own. 9/11 is a system that works almost purely on anecdotal evidence with little to no corroboration.

So, do you have any?

Any what?

 

[RoboTimbo]

There's evidence, just not good evidence. Testimony is evidence.

Can you give an example of testimonial evidence as it relates to alien space ships?

 

[Fudbucker]

Testimony is a claim, it needs to be backed up by evidence, a claim can not be evidence that a claim is accurate.

And every testimony regarding UFOs that has ever been successfully resolved has turned out to be not an alien craft.

The latter may be true but the former is wrong. I doubt your friends/family ask you for corroborating evidence when you recount the events of the day. No, you expect to be believed on anecdotal testimony alone. Perfectly acceptable. You would be insulted if you told your doctor you were allergic to sulfa-based medicines and he demanded to run a test to verify.

You're being silly. If there is no evidence for the existence of something, the default position is that the something does not exist.

No, and I'll be surprised if someone doesn't call you out on that.

 

[Fudbucker]

Can you give an example of testimonial evidence as it relates to alien space ships?

I don't know enough about ufology. I suspect all the cases can be chalked up to hallucinations, lies, mistakes, etc. However, that many people reporting strange things in the sky, makes me wonder a little.

 

[RoboTimbo]

I don't know enough about ufology. I suspect all the cases can be chalked up to hallucinations, lies, mistakes, etc. However, that many people reporting strange things in the sky, makes me wonder a little.

Why?

 

[Tomtomkent]

At relatavistic velocities, you can travel pretty far in a pretty short amount of time (ship time).

Not far enough fast enough. I'm afraid wishful thinking and suggesting "if" aliens could do something is not good enough. Besides which, shipboard time may be experienced at a faster rate, but the ship will interact with a universe experiencing far more time. Far more time in which materials be bombarded with temperature changes, debris, strains and stresses. Your argument is far from convincing.

Nitpick: space is not absolute zero.

Indeed. Space includes a wide variety of temperatures and hazards. Something you are still blithely ignoring.

We haven't even visited the nearest planet yet. I wouldn't preclude interstellar travel based on our limited knowledge of materials science.

Nor would I. But I would call it improbable based on the extent of our knowledge, because of what we do no about the limitations of materials.

Depends on your frame of reference.

No. It really doesn't.

Pretend you have a rock moving through water at a relativistic speed. The rock may "experience" ten or fifteen years, but the water experiences hundreds of years. Do you really think the rock wont be erroded by the water? Do you think saying to the water that it has the wrong frame of reference will some how lessen the effects of the water on the rock? Of course not. Frame of reference means nothing. Nada. Nowt.

Machines can't pilot craft? According to some people here, machines are already conscious.

So you intend to argue against the free pass I gave? Really?

 

[Tomtomkent]

I don't know enough about ufology.

Ignorance of Ufology is not what is making your arguments fail. Ignorance, or falacious use of, pretty much all the terminology you have tossed out there is what is failing to convince.

Take SETI. There are two recent posts where you mention SETI in relation to evidence for UFOs possibly being alien. Why?

SETI monitors (or monitered for those reading in the near post-cut future) targetted star systems for evidence of transmissions. SETI is a good place to look for regular patterns picked up by radio telescopes that may represent possible deliberate broadcasts.

It is not the place to look for evidence of UFOs.
It is not the place to look for evidence of alien races having the technology to travel between stars.
It is not the place to look for evidence of alien visitation.

Your posts imply you are relying on a far more science fiction version of SETI than the rest of us, and it is one example. Your attitude towards the null hypothosis, arguing that people such as myself "preclude" events we have only deemed "unlikely" or "improbable" based on lack of evidence is another.

 

[Tomtomkent]

No, and I'll be surprised if someone doesn't call you out on that.

Actually "yes". It is the Null Hypothosis.

Assuming you paid attention to science class at school you probably had the invisible dragon thought experiment as a teaching aid for the null. See if this sounds familiar:


I tell you one day that I have an invisible dragon living in my cellar. Being invisible he can't be seen. He floats just above the floor so he never leaves footprints, he is intangible so can not be felt, is silent so can not be heard, has no odour, does not breath, and can not be detected by any equipment known to man. All you have by way of evidence is my word for his existence, and a scattering of other people who think they once saw something in their celler that they claim was evidence of their own dragons.

So which is the correct response to take: The stance you are taking towards a UFO being an alien craft, that is "it has to be considered as a serious possibility and assumed such things can exist because we don't know."
Or the hard core UFOlogist, religious believer, etc: "It must be real because enough people have claimed to encounter it so it must be real?"
Or The Null Hypothosis: "We have no evidence and no way of gathering evidence, ergo we assume the null, being that there is no invisible dragon and all apparent encounters are explained by mundane causes until such a time as possitive evidence is presented."

The Null is a key part of falsifying any scientific claim. The Null on medical trials is not "This mediceine will work", or "this medicine will harm you", it is "this medicine will have no measurable effect good or ill", and through clinical trials evidence is gathered to overcome the null in one direction or the other.

 

[Stray Cat]

The latter may be true but the former is wrong. I doubt your friends/family ask you for corroborating evidence when you recount the events of the day. No, you expect to be believed on anecdotal testimony alone. Perfectly acceptable.

The events of my day rarely would cause the path of scientific understanding to require significantly updating.
No doubt you've heard the phrase; Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence?

You would be insulted if you told your doctor you were allergic to sulfa-based medicines and he demanded to run a test to verify.

No I wouldn't, unless I was able to show him my medical records that showed tests had already been done and showed my anecdote to be true.

No, and I'll be surprised if someone doesn't call you out on that.

If you're that confident, why don't you be the one to call me out on it?
And I don't mean simply claim I'm wrong, I mean show me why I'm wrong.

 

[Stray Cat]

No. Anecdotes do not need to be corroborated to count as evidence. They can quite easily stand on their own. 9/11 is a system that works almost purely on anecdotal evidence with little to no corroboration.

9/11 anecdotes have lead to some wildly inaccurate theories. Where corroborating evidence is available it only ever shows how inaccurate the anecdotes are.

 

[Resume]

No. Anecdotes do not need to be corroborated to count as evidence. They can quite easily stand on their own. 9/11 is a system that works almost purely on anecdotal evidence with little to no corroboration.

An anecdote, like a 911 call, may or may not lead to further investigation after an initial examination; it is entirely dependent on the nature of the anecdote. A claim, like an alien craft sighting, is not evidence for itself, in and of itself.

 

[Resume]

I don't know enough about ufology. I suspect all the cases can be chalked up to hallucinations, lies, mistakes, etc. However, that many people reporting strange things in the sky, makes me wonder a little.

What's to wonder about? Substitute ghosts or bigfoot for OMGAliens and you have a lot of strange things being reported.

 

[Stray Cat]

An anecdote, like a 911 call, may or may not lead to further investigation after an initial examination; it is entirely dependent on the nature of the anecdote. A claim, like an alien craft sighting, is not evidence for itself, in and of itself.

If Fudbucker was talking about 911 emergency calls, then of course all calls need corroboration. If you call and claim to have seen a bank being robbed and when the police turn up there is no evidence of a bank being robbed, the person making the call will not be believed and the anecdote given during the 911 call can safely be ignored because it has no corroboration.

 

[RoboTimbo]

The latter may be true but the former is wrong. I doubt your friends/family ask you for corroborating evidence when you recount the events of the day.

If the events of the day include going to the grocery store and having lunch, then no corroborating evidence would be needed. Claiming to go to the grocery store on Mars and lunching on Venus with Elvis might need some drilling down.

No, you expect to be believed on anecdotal testimony alone. Perfectly acceptable.

Correct, mundane claims which wouldn't cause a paradigm shift don't usually need corroborating evidence.

You would be insulted if you told your doctor you were allergic to sulfa-based medicines and he demanded to run a test to verify.

We know that allergies exist and sulfa-based medicines exist. If you tell him you're allergic to the invisible pink dragon in your garage and it's causing you to grow an invisible pink horn out of your forehead, you might need an entirely different doctor.

No, and I'll be surprised if someone doesn't call you out on that.

You go first.

 

[tsig]

Why is that improbable?

It's a long way to go and a short time to get there.

(Interstellar distances are enormous. lifespans are not)

 

[tsig]

As far as we can tell, Earth is the only planet in the universe with life. I wouldn't presume to rule out fast interstellar travel. If you get up to high enough relatavistic speeds, you don't need to bother with ark or generation ships.

By the time you get to where you're going the universe may have ended.

 

[tsig]

At relatavistic velocities, you can travel pretty far in a pretty short amount of time (ship time).



Nitpick: space is not absolute zero.

We haven't even visited the nearest planet yet. I wouldn't preclude interstellar travel based on our limited knowledge of materials science.



Depends on your frame of reference.




Machines can't pilot craft? According to some people here, machines are already conscious.

Machines generally have a shorter lifespan than humans. How many 30 year old cars are still on the road?