UFOs: The Research, the Evidence

[Astrophotographer]

possible[/I] for this method to have been utilised and if possibility is good enough for you, it is good enough for me. According to your own logic (that you and others have repeated so often in this thread) YOU now must prove that this method of framing and taking the photos did NOT occur…

Actually, you are again wrong here. We are faced with two possibilities:

1) The image was taken from low level through the normal viewfinder of a model in such a way as to make it appear high in the sky (as proposed by Mr. Carpenter). This is the hoax scenario, which can happen.

2) The image was shot using the waist viewfinder of an unconventional craft that is never been flown by any nation of this earth. This is the alien spaceship scenario.

We really have to have some sort of proof that such craft exist to give #2 a higher probability than #1. Hoaxes happen. We don't know about alien spaceships. If it were a photograph of a flying dragon, would you be more willing or less willing to believe it is authentic?

As for the hoax model. Joel pondered this and proposed this possible model:



Look familiar? Maybe this will help:



This is not the exact model but it does look very familiar. It even has a "tower" that is tilted to one side just like the Trent's UFO.

 

[Astrophotographer]

However independent photo analysis by Hartmann (in Condon - http://ncas.org/condon/text/case46.htm) and by Dr Bruce Maccabee (http://www.brumac.8k.com/trent1.html) seems to rule that out. If you disagree with those eminent person’s analyses on the matter, perhaps you can show how both might have been mistaken?

I could have sworn I pointed out that Hartmann's position changed after discussing it with Sheaffer. Now you only use his original article on the subject to make it appear that Hartmann is endorsing the ET explanation for this photograph.

Btw, Hartmann did not state the model could not be hung from the wires:

Yet, the fact that the object appears beneath the same part of the overhead wire in both photos can be used as an argument favoring a suspended model.

(this comes from the link you provided in case you can't find it yourself).

IMO, the model does not have to be hung from the wires to suspend the model. Another arrangement could be made. The photograph of one of the Trent's children on a ladder for Life magazine makes me wonder.......

 

[Astrophotographer]

Well, understandably I am loathe to take on too many cases at once – and there have been complaints by the UFO debunkers also about my doing that - but just for your OWN amusement at this stage…

The Travis Walton Abduction (5 Nov 1975)
(http://www.travis-walton.com/index.shtml)
(http://www.ufoevidence.org/topics/traviswalton.htm)
(http://www.ufocasebook.com/Walton.html)
Debunker: (http://www.debunker.com/texts/walton.html)
Reply to debunker:
Part I: (http://ufomedia.blogspot.com/2007/04/travis-walton-hoax-that-wasnt.html)
Part II: (http://ufomedia.blogspot.com/2007/04/travis-walton-hoax-that-wasnt_08.html)

Is a NEW BEST CASE? Is this the bottom line? Will this be the case that ends this constant "death spiral"? If it is shown to have flaws, will you finally admit the evidence for the ET explanation for UFOs is not as solid as you think?

 

[Jack by the hedge]

If so, then of course you will seriously analyse the independent photo analysis conducted by Hartmann (in Condon - http://ncas.org/condon/text/case46.htm) and by Dr Bruce Maccabee (http://www.brumac.8k.com/trent1.html) that certainly rules a “hubcap thrown by a guy” out.

As I said, I look forward to YOUR serious analysis. Is that coming any time soon?

Re. Hartmann: He says it was unlikely to be a frisbee because the "pole" on the object appears to be offset to the left in both pictures, therefore it's probably not rotating. (He appears to favour a slightly different means of fakery, involving hanging the model from a wire.)

Pardon me for daring to doubt anyone's eminence, but exactly how unlikely do you estimate it to be that two snapshots could coincidentally capture a thrown object in broadly the same orientation? How similar is the orientation anyway? The two pictures could easily show the same object rotated by as much as 90°. Would you care to put a figure on how unlikely that is, especially given that we don't have the negatives to prove that only two pictures were taken?

Re. Maccabee: You know what? I really can't be bothered. The original claim is yours, so the burden is yours. Bring us YOUR serious analysis.

 

[Astrophotographer]

slowly[/I] making it entirely possible to “track” (or frame it in shot) with the “waist level” view finder.

If the object was moving slowly and just simply hovering, why does he use the following phrases?

Witness II ran to the car

re-wound his film as fast as possible and then as the object gathered speed and turned toward the northwest, he had to move rapidly to his right to get the second picture

"ran" "rapidly" "as fast as possible" all indicate a sense of urgency. The last thing anybody would want to do under those conditions is use the waist viewfinder. However, we are talking about UFOs, where the normal is abnormal and common sense does not prevail.

I think we are done with this case and I vote to move onward to the next item. All points have been covered and argued endlessly with no resolution. No proof that aliens are involved has been offered and the photographs themselves are subjective in the interpretation of what they show.

 

[shandyjan]

When I was a kid, we glued one of those pantyhose 'egg' things to a frisbee, threw it around and took double-exposure photos. I shudder to think that they may end up floating on the 'net somewhere as 'evidence,' but if I find them I will post.

It's people like you who cause a 1000 problems
I still dont know why people can take perfectly clear pictures of aircraft, and even rockets, and ufo's are so hard to decipher. The ufo's are interesting, but no matter how long this thread goes on, I still think the aliens are light years away from earth! (If they exist)

 

[wollery]

And still no sign that Rramjet has any idea how to do basic physics, has any answers for the many questions I raised over the Freidman link that he introduced, or any admission that my posts on that subject even exist.

Every post I make on it makes it look more and more like you're embarrassed by the whole episode, and just wish it would go away. But I'm going to keep bringing this up, it isn't going away.

 

[TjW]

It's people like you who cause a 1000 problems
I still dont know why people can take perfectly clear pictures of aircraft, and even rockets, and ufo's are so hard to decipher. The ufo's are interesting, but no matter how long this thread goes on, I still think the aliens are light years away from earth! (If they exist)

I believe it's because the UFOs are piloted by Bigfoot. You'll notice they have similar problems with being photographed.

 

[Stray Cat]

Well, sure, but do you know how journalists work. Let me tell you, they pose you in precisely the way THEY want to compose THEIR picture – it hardly matters to them what the external reality of the situation might be (or have been), it is all down to how THEY want to represent things

Bravo... you've just described the UFologists.

So you see, the UFO was moving slowly making it entirely possible to “track” (or frame it in shot) with the “waist level” view finder.

No one's saying it was impossible, just wondering why choose the difficult way, when there is a perfectly good eye level viewfinder that doesn't have all the disadvantages of the waist level postage stamp sized, inverted viewfinder.

Not only that, in your diagrammatic representation, you have the UFO moving NW when it was actually described as moving West. A small point I know but given your statement that the diagram was drawn “as accurately as possible from the information available”, it shows that this statement at least is false.

We've been through this before... The object could have been anywhere along each of the sight lines, which is why I didn't put the object in the diagram, but drew straight lines which it could be placed on at any point to get the correct alignment. The arrow I placed on representing the objects (claimed) direction of travel was simply to show it was moving from right to left. The plan diagram in the Condon report also shows an arrow at roughly this same angle... Which is South West actually, not NW as you state.

And just what is your diagram purporting to show anyway? As I remember it when you originally posted it was to show that the “sightlines” crossed at a point underneath the overhead wires and thus it was possible to “hang” a fake UFO from the wires in that position and still represent the apparent movement of the UFO between P1 and P2.

Quite simply, it shows that the object could have been suspended from the overhead wires. As the point that the two sight lines cross is the point where the object would have to be and coincidentally, is the position of the overhead wires.

However independent photo analysis by Hartmann (in Condon - http://ncas.org/condon/text/case46.htm) and by Dr Bruce Maccabee (http://www.brumac.8k.com/trent1.html) seems to rule that out. If you disagree with those eminent person’s analyses on the matter, perhaps you can show how both might have been mistaken?

Hartman changed his mind when confronted with Sheaffer's analysis and Maccabee is not independent.

Next.

 

[Rramjet]

And still no sign that Rramjet has any idea how to do basic physics, has any answers for the many questions I raised over the Freidman link that he introduced, or any admission that my posts on that subject even exist.

Every post I make on it makes it look more and more like you're embarrassed by the whole episode, and just wish it would go away. But I'm going to keep bringing this up, it isn't going away.

I am not embarrassed in the slightest. I am merely pointing out that reliance on chemical energy and 1950s technology is an extremely narrow conception of science and what might be possible in the future (or available to ET right now). For example:

(and I reference here: Barrow, J., D. (1998) Impossibility: The Limits of Science and the Science of Limits. Vintage Books, London.)

The leading American Physicist and future Nobel physics Laureate Albert Michealson claimed in a public lecture at the University of Chicago in 1894 that:

The most important fundamental laws and facts of physical science have all been discovered and these are now so firmly established that the possibility of their ever being supplanted in consequence of new discoveries is exceedingly remote, nevertheless, it has been found that there are apparent exceptions to most of these laws, and this is particularly true when the observations are pushed to the limit… our future discoveries must be looked for in the sixth place of the decimals. It follows that every means which facilitates accuracy in measurement is a possible factor in a future discovery”​

(p.54)

The revolution began in 1905. Soon there would be developments which would bring new theories of quantum mechanics, relativity, atomic structure, and gravitation onto the scene. Curiously none of them was triggered by some new measurement of natural phenomena at unprecedented accuracy finding a new and unexpected layer of unexplained detail. All revolutions would begin from within the heart of what was known. (p.55)

(As an aside - did you know that quantum mechanics was unable to be experimentally tested for almost 50 years after it was developed!? Yet during those 50 years advances in the theory were forthcoming - even before it was testable as any hypothesis! Rr)

It is one thing to know the laws of Nature, but quite another to know the outcomes of those laws. (p.66)

There may be no limit to the number of different complex structures that can be generated by combinations of matter and energy. Many of the most complicated examples we know of – brains, living things, computers, nervous systems - have structures which are not illuminated by the possession of a Theory of Everything. They are of course, permitted to exist by such a theory. But they are able to display the complex behaviours they do because of the ways in which their subcomponents are organised. It is one thing to have a Theory of Everything: quite another to find all (or even some) of its solutions. (p.67)

At any moment in history there are not merely questions one can ask but cannot answer, there are question which there is no reason to ask. Whatever economic and human resources were made available to Pythagoras for the purposes of investigating the natural world, the results would have been rather shallow even by our own standards. He would not have known what questions to ask, nor could he have known. There is no reason to doubt that the present state of affairs is any different. (p. 70)

…perhaps they would be able to tap into the quantum zero-point energy of the universe and use that as energy. (p.136)

We also appreciate that there may be peculiar configuration of mass and energy which permit time travel to occur, or for local “wormhole” connections to be forged between parts of the Universe which appear (in terms of conventional light travel times) to be enormously distant. (p. 137)

 

[Akhenaten]

What's that supposed to be Rramjet? It sure doesn't look lke evidence of ETs to me.

Are you sure you posted that in the right thread? There's been a little confusion lately.

Or at least there will be now, while you frantically search for the other threads where this is being discussed.

 

[Rramjet]

Bravo... you've just described the UFologists.

…or UFO debunkers! LOL

No one's saying it was impossible, just wondering why choose the difficult way, when there is a perfectly good eye level viewfinder that doesn't have all the disadvantages of the waist level postage stamp sized, inverted viewfinder.

Anyone used to the camera would have had no trouble at all with the horizontal view finder… indeed, it is possible that they would actually find it easier and more convenient to use. The very fact that there WAS such a view finder incorporated into the popular camera – even when an “eye-level” viewfinder was available - is testament to the fact that many people found it easy to use because that is what they were used to having on their cameras.

We've been through this before... The object could have been anywhere along each of the sight lines, which is why I didn't put the object in the diagram, but drew straight lines which it could be placed on at any point to get the correct alignment. The arrow I placed on representing the objects (claimed) direction of travel was simply to show it was moving from right to left. The plan diagram in the Condon report also shows an arrow at roughly this same angle... Which is South West actually, not NW as you state.

Once again you miss a vital detail of the Condon diagram. The “arrow” included in the Condon diagram (http://ncas.org/condon/text/cs46fg01.htm) is actually a distance indicator…NOT a direction indicator (if you look closely you will see another arrow in the diagram, closer to the house, representing another distance estimate in the same way) . I believe I pointed this out to you at the time we were discussing this in the other thread. Why am I not surprised that you never bothered to check the Condon diagram at the time?

The actual direction of the UFO itself is - as described by the witnesses - is WESTERLY… You mistakenly get SW from your misconception of the Condon diagram. I posted the link – perhaps now you will look and verify my statements for yourself (?) before you make the same mistake all over again if you discuss this at a future date.

Quite simply, it shows that the object could have been suspended from the overhead wires. As the point that the two sight lines cross is the point where the object would have to be and coincidentally, is the position of the overhead wires.

But the independently conducted photo analysis (by Hartmann and Maccabee) tends to rule the “fake model” hypothesis out. Is there anywhere in that analysis that you can point to that is in error in this regard?

Hartman changed his mind when confronted with Sheaffer's analysis and Maccabee is not independent.

Sheaffer’s (or Klass’) analysis? I presume you mean here? (http://www.debunker.com/trent.html) Please point to ANYWHERE in that document where Sheaffer conducted any photometric or photogrammetric analysis of the UFO or the wires… or anything like an instrumented scientific analysis of the type Hartmann conducted and particularly by Dr Maccabee.

 

[Rramjet]

What's that supposed to be Rramjet? It sure doesn't look lke evidence of ETs to me.

Are you sure you posted that in the right thread? There's been a little confusion lately.

Or at least there will be now, while you frantically search for the other threads where this is being discussed.

Why am I not surprised that you did not get it?

 

[Akhenaten]

Why am I not surprised that you did not get it?

Because you have no idea of my capabilities or why one should avoid double-negatives unless engaging in rhetoric.


Oh, wait . . .


BTW:

These are both fakes. Why did you try and pass one of them off as evidence?

 

[Stray Cat]

…or UFO debunkers! LOL

More misuse of the word 'debunker' there.

Anyone used to the camera would have had no trouble at all with the horizontal view finder… indeed, it is possible that they would actually find it easier and more convenient to use. The very fact that there WAS such a view finder incorporated into the popular camera – even when an “eye-level” viewfinder was available - is testament to the fact that many people found it easy to use because that is what they were used to having on their cameras.

There is a practical reason for having a waist level viewfinder. It has a specific purpose, photographing moving objects wasn't it. Which is why the camera had two different view options. No one (except maybe a professional photographer) would think of using the waist level view finder to track and photograph a moving object... of course, if the object wasn't moving, it would make perfect sense. But we seem to be at 'your opinion, versus my opinion'. And with my experience and formal training in photography, I think my opinion is better informed than yours.

Once again you miss a vital detail of the Condon diagram. The “arrow” included in the Condon diagram (http://ncas.org/condon/text/cs46fg01.htm) is actually a distance indicator…NOT a direction indicator (if you look closely you will see another arrow in the diagram, closer to the house, representing another distance estimate in the same way) . I believe I pointed this out to you at the time we were discussing this in the other thread.

I didn't miss it, it's irrelevant. The distance indicator is indicating that the object was on one position and then moved to another position and the distance between the two positions is 'x' however, in the process of moving from one position to the next, the object moved in a south westerly direction. Not that it's important as I don't believe the object moved in any direction.

Why am I not surprised that you never bothered to check the Condon diagram at the time?

I have the Condon diagram on my computer, I used information from it to draw my diagram, how can you say I didn't check it?
I also addressed this issue in the other thread where this was discussed so please stop with the nonsense.

The actual direction of the UFO itself is - as described by the witnesses - is WESTERLY… You mistakenly get SW from your misconception of the Condon diagram. I posted the link – perhaps now you will look and verify my statements for yourself (?) before you make the same mistake all over again if you discuss this at a future date.

It had been addressed and is irrelevant. The exact direction of the object according to the witnesses changed (at one point it supposedly did a loop?), overall it was heading between west and south west. But I'm not going to go over that conversation with you again, it's pointless.

But the independently conducted photo analysis (by Hartmann and Maccabee) tends to rule the “fake model” hypothesis out. Is there anywhere in that analysis that you can point to that is in error in this regard?

I've already pointed out the flaw in the process used for analysis. It's contrived and doesn't take account of the possibilities. My guess is that this method is the only one that would arrive at the end result Maccabee was looking for.

Sheaffer’s (or Klass’) analysis? I presume you mean here? (http://www.debunker.com/trent.html) Please point to ANYWHERE in that document where Sheaffer conducted any photometric or photogrammetric analysis of the UFO or the wires… or anything like an instrumented scientific analysis of the type Hartmann conducted and particularly by Dr Maccabee.

There is no need to do such a convoluted analysis. Especially one that doesn't take into account all the possible possibilities. But of course Maccabee needs to do it this way so he can hand wave the real possibilities away... 'This is the result I want, now let's worl backward from that to explain it'.

So we are left with a photo that is disputed, witness reports that are disputed and even if we drop the objections to the photos and the witnesses and forget the complete bias of everything that Maccabee published, we are left with a photo of something UNIDENTIFIED.

 

[Sledge]

It's a simple enough question, Rramjet: if the picture is genuine, how does it prove aliens?

 

[Stray Cat]

Because you have no idea of my capabilities or why one should avoid double-negatives unless engaging in rhetoric.


Oh, wait . . .


BTW:

These are both fakes. Why did you try and pass one of them off as evidence?

http://www.yvonneclaireadams.com/HostedStuff/UFO4.jpg​

I had a discussion on another board recently about these:

Photos promoted by the hoaxer Bob Dean... Evidence pah!

 

[Akhenaten]

It's unbelievable to me that people in this day and age insist on trying to prove anything at all with posted 'photographs'.

For Farouk's sake, you can get, or make, a photo of anything you want.

 

[Akhenaten]

It's a simple enough question, Rramjet: if the picture is genuine, how does it prove aliens?

The bit I don't understand about Rramjet's strategy/tactics is what is the ultimate desired outcome?

Even if, in the unlikely event that one or two people believe any of the non-evidence presented in this thread, so what? There are fruitcakes on teh webs who think the Earth is hollow too, and look at the massive impact they're not having.

 

[Marduk]

It's unbelievable to me that people in this day and age insist on trying to prove anything at all with posted 'photographs'.

For Farouk's sake, you can get, or make, a photo of anything you want.

the most convincing photo I've seen in this thread so far had a blimp with "gay rodeo" written on the side